India, Japan reviews DMIC project

New Delhi, July 20 (UNI) India and Japan have reviewed progress on the ambitious 1,483 km Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) project, which is slated to be launched early next year.

Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath reviewed the progress on the project with Japanese Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs Masahoru Kohno here yesterday, besides discussing trade issues that are likely to dominate the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit in August, an official statement said today.

The concept paper for the project would be finalised before the visit of Prime Minister Abe and work on the first phase would begin by January 2008 and would be completed by 2012.

Japan is one of the major funders of the corridor, whose cost estimates have doubled to 90 billion dollars after a recent review.

In April, it was said the project would cost 40-50 billion dollars.

The project runs through Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra and touches Madhya Pradesh.

Mr Nath would be inaugurating the Indo-Japan Business Leaders Forum during the Prime Minister's visit and would release a joint statement emphasising the major role of the private sector in strategic economic engagement.

Both sides are expected to nominate top Chief Executive Officers for inclusion in the Business Leaders Forum.

He also said trade talks between India and Japan would be more pragmatic and any negotiations between the two is likely to be more sustainable since both countries appreciate and understand each others' sensitivities.

The discussion also reviewed several issues of bilateral importance as part of the India-Japan Strategic Dialogue on economic issues, the statement said.

India will ask the Japanese government to contribute 50 per cent to the 250 million-dollar Project Development Fund for the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) when officials of both countries meet next week in Tokyo.

The fund would be used for laying the ground work for various projects in the corridor that would be given to the private sector to execute after a bidding process.

It would be utilised for preparing the project report and getting clearances for various components of the corridor would come back after private players take it over.

''The task force on DMIC will meet in Japan next week to finalise the Project Development Fund. While Japanese government would provide 125 million dollars, the rest would come from Indian entities,'' Secretary in the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion Ajay Dua said.

He said during the Japan visit, Indian officials would also meet Japanese financial institutions and representatives of the Tokyo Stock Exchange to discuss various options for funding the components of the project.

Mr Dua said the fund is likely to be launched during Japanese Prime Minister's visit to India next month.

The work on the 1,483 km-industrial corridor is expected to start next year and in the first phase, 12 nodes would be taken up for development of investment regions, industrial parks, special economic zones and other supporting infrastructure.

The first phase would coincide with the construction of the Delhi-Mumbai freight corridor and would be completed by 2012.

The second phase of the project would be completed by 2018.

UNI