TN Govt to create 20 lakh jobs by 2011

Chennai, Jan 18 (UNI) The Tamil Nadu Government will create 20 lakh new jobs by 2011 and double the State's export to Rs 140,000 crore as envisaged in the new industrial policy, Chief Minister M Karunanidhi said today.

Inaugurating the annual entrepreneurship awards function 'TIECON-2008' here, he said that to achieve this, the Government would support development of 'Centres of Excellence and Innovation' to develop a pool of world-class scientists and technologies in areas of chip and electronic hardware design, leather product design and automotive design.

Mr Karunanidhi said the Government would also provide assistance to technology innovators or stand alone Research and Development units or individuals for innovations capable of industrial application.

The State Government would also develop industrial parks and promote industrial corridors like Chennai-Bangalore, Madurai-Tuticorin and Coimbatore-Salem, besides setting up Nano technology and Bio-IT parks.

Urging the industrialists to focus their innovation on the needs of common man, Mr Karunanidhi said that if the lifestyle of the common man improved, the bottomline of all the companies would also improve automatically.

The DMK regime in its 20-month rule had created 1.25 lakh job opportunities and signed MoUs with 11 global companies to bring investments to the tune of Rs 11,083 crore, he said, adding that many more MoUs would be signed in the coming months to make Tamil Nadu the favoured choice for investments.

Earlier, the Chief Minister gave away the Lifetime Achievement award to Apollo Hospitals Chairman Dr Pratap C Reddy.

Other awardees include Mr R Subramanian (Subhiksha), Ms Hemu Ramiah (Landmark), Mr S Abhaya Kumar (LifeCell), Mr Vivek Anand (FitnessOne) and Ms Y G Parthasarathy (PSBB Schools).

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