India’s Hinduja Group seeks to strengthen ties with Sri Lanka
Daily FT: Sri Lankan High Commissioner to the United Kingdom Rohitha Bogollagama participated in a productive meeting with Hinduja Chairman Gopichand P. Hinduja, Ashok Leyland Chairman Dheeraj G. Hinduja, Hinduja Investments Project Services CEO Vivek Nanda and their senior management team on 29 July.
The Hinduja Group has excelled in diverse fields with a strong global presence in areas such as shipping, automotive manufacturing, renewable energy, IT-enabled services, banking and financial services, trading, healthcare, real estate, and petroleum downstream development.
The meeting aimed at further strengthening the long-standing trade and economic cooperation between Sri Lanka and the Hinduja Group. The key areas discussed during the meeting included investment opportunities for the Hinduja Group in the Colombo Port City Development Project, the utilisation of existing Ashok Leyland facilities in Sri Lanka for the manufacturing of electric automotive, and expanding Hinduja Global Solutions’ IT-enabled services operations to Sri Lanka considering the availability of skilled manpower in the IT, accounting, legal, marketing, and healthcare sectors.
The meeting marks a significant step in uplifting the existing trade and economic relations between Sri Lanka and the Hinduja Group, with promising mutual benefits and collaborative growth.
OSL take:
The further strengthening of ties between Sri Lanka and India as well as the overall economic expansion of Sri Lanka have attracted the attention of many Indian businesses/investors among other foreign businesses/investors to explore business/investment opportunities in the country. Sri Lanka’s growing business potential has resulted in many large-scale Indian businesses exploring business/investment opportunities in all key economic sectors in the country. The potential growth in opportunities due to Sri Lanka’s work to achieve the target of becoming a regional hub while expanding the business/investment opportunities in Sri Lanka, have also served to give a confidence boost to foreign businesses/investors, especially Indian businesses to look at further strengthening ties with Sri Lanka. With Sri Lanka and India working on further strengthening the free trade agreement (FTA) between the two countries with the proposed ETCA, there would be a further growth in the business, trade and investment ties between the two countries. Apart from Indian businesses/investors therefore looking at further expanding ties with Sri Lanka, other foreign businesses/investors could look at setting up bases in Sri Lanka to do business with India using the preferential treatment enjoyed by Sri Lanka with the Indians.