Rama Krishna Sangem
Leading investment banker, tech entrepreneur and senior BJP leader Sudhakar Gande had a meeting with EU India Chamber of Commerce (EUICC) in Brussels on September 13, Friday. He held talks with EUICC secretary Sunil Prasad discussed about the need to speed up an FTA between both the countries to accelerate trade and commerce. Prasad is based out of Brussels for about three decades. EUICC has around 1,500 companies as members.
Gande, currently on a visit to Europe, himself owns a couple of technology companies which are part of the EUICC. He asked Prasad to lead a small team of EUICC to India soon to see the rapid changes that are taking place in the country. Several initiatives including the recent announcement of Semicon India project provide greater business opportunities to EU.
PM Modi’s semiconductor manufacturing initiative seeks to place India among the top 10 chip supply chain countries in the world. Already, the US and EU too have taken similar initiatives on the front. Gande told the EUICC leaders that coming years offer greater scope for business ties expansion.
EUICC has been striving for the last 32 years to promote trade and commerce between the two geographies. “There has been a substantial growth in the business between EU and India in the last one decade. But, this is heavily placed in favor of EU and India is lagging behind. This needs to be correcte5d,” Gande told Prasad.
EU ranks No 3 for India in terms of trade. But, India comes 9th or 10th for EU bilateral trade, which is pegged at around 120 billion US dollars currently. Both Gande and Prasad agreed to back efforts to put in place an FTA between the two geographies at the earliest. It is expected the pact would be sealed soon, just after an FTA between India and the UK.
