Companies, including Adani and Reliance, committed major growth plans and investments during the Saurashtra-Kutch edition of the Vibrant Gujarat Regional Conferences (VGRC), which was inaugurated on Sunday at Rajkot.
The two-day conference, aimed at boosting growth within different regions of Gujarat and attracting investments, witnessed the attendance of Prime Minister Narendra Modi as well.
Scaling Infrastructure
In his speech, Karan Adani, Managing Director of Adani Ports and SEZ Limited (APSEZ), committed to investing Rs 1.5 lakh crore over the next five years to the region of Kutch, in addition to fully operationalizing Adani’s 37 Gigawatts (GW) renewable energy park in Khavda by 2030 and doubling the company’s port capacity at Mundra over the next 10 years.
Reliance’s Vision
Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries, is also committed to a five-pronged plan for Gujarat, stating, “In the last five years, we have invested Rs 3.5 lakh crore in Gujarat. We will double it to Rs 7 lakh crore over the next five years, creating exponential employment, livelihoods, and greater sampatti for every Gujarati and Indian.”
The remaining four commitments were completing the world’s largest integrated clean energy ecosystem in Jamnagar, operationalising Reliance’s multi-Gigawatt utility-scale solar project in Khavda, building India’s largest artificial intelligence (AI)-ready data centre in Jamnagar, and partnering for India’s 2036 Olympic ambitions.
Companies, including Welspun World, also attended the conference, with Founder and Chairman BK Goenka sharing how Welspun’s newest facility in Kutch has directly and indirectly employed over one lakh people. He also announced Welspun Corp’s Rs 5,000 crore investment in its pipeline production vertical, which would make it the world’s largest pipe manufacturing company.
During the conference, PM Modi talked about Gujarat’s growth over the years as a major investment and manufacturing hub, highlighting Saurashtra’s manufacturing capabilities with over 2.5 lakh MSMEs spanning various industries. He emphasised the importance of making Kutch and Saurashtra hubs for renewable energy production and noted how many global institutions are bullish on India, stating, “India is the world’s third-largest startup ecosystem, the third-largest aviation market, and in the top three metro networks of the world.” He added the immense potential of the Dholera Special Investment Region (SIR), saying that the world’s largest semiconductor fabrication plant is being built there.