Thursday, September 17, 2009
Talks on financial city in full swing
From The Hindu
* Stalin to visit potential sites to indicate his view
* Group discussions with finance service firms on
CHENNAI: Discussions between the State Industries Ministry and industry representatives on plans for the Chennai financial city are gaining momentum: the location of the city is to be finalised in one month and a list of potential occupants and the nature of services are to be finalised in two months.
“The Deputy Chief Minister will visit several potential sites for the financial city and then indicate his view,” a senior official in the Ministry said, speaking to The Hindu. Group consultations with a number of financial service companies are under way, he added.
Outlining the next steps, he said, “What we would like to do is to identify maybe ten possible services we could offer and of those we can decide on two or three to offer at first. And for those two or three, we would try to identify a list of ten or twenty companies that we would like to target.” This would be followed by presentations to these target companies on the services that the financial city would offer.
The ongoing discussions are also looking into the question of what incentives the occupants of the city should be offered. Highlighting capital investment incentives and tax sops given in the manufacturing sector, the Ministry official said: “For the financial city we need to understand what incentives would excite them. There is no point in saying, ‘We will give you this’ if that does not change his decision and we still end up giving the incentive.” To avoid this situation, a brief survey would be undertaken to ask prospective occupants: “What are the five things which you think are most important?”
Foreign players coming in
Discussions are also focussed on the process of identifying the list of potential occupants.
The plan to offer the services of the financial city to foreign players could be traced back to the banking roadmap that the RBI had earlier given. According to the roadmap, foreign banks could grow organically in India by opening new branches.
In this context, there is an opportunity. “We need to determine which banks have aggressively tried to get branch licences – that shows their intentions. Also, some of those who have already started some kind of office presence in India, we could approach them as that could be one list,” the official said. The same would apply to insurance companies that have struck agreements with local players.
The initiative is being developed in coordination with the Confederation of Indian Industry, the official confirmed. “We believe that in Tamil Nadu we have very good responsible and responsive industry and we can work in tandem,” he said.
Outlining the CII’s role, he explained that they are also coming out with ideas and suggestions and are in touch with other financial centres. The immediate steps, however, are concerned with defining the “product” more clearly.
“What we are very clear on is that our approach would not be to announce something very big, very huge, to dazzle,” the official said. The aim would be to forge a strong partnership with the private sector and try and take local players along, including Tamil Nadu-based organisations and then, moving forward, organisations in other parts of the country.
* Stalin to visit potential sites to indicate his view
* Group discussions with finance service firms on
CHENNAI: Discussions between the State Industries Ministry and industry representatives on plans for the Chennai financial city are gaining momentum: the location of the city is to be finalised in one month and a list of potential occupants and the nature of services are to be finalised in two months.
“The Deputy Chief Minister will visit several potential sites for the financial city and then indicate his view,” a senior official in the Ministry said, speaking to The Hindu. Group consultations with a number of financial service companies are under way, he added.
Outlining the next steps, he said, “What we would like to do is to identify maybe ten possible services we could offer and of those we can decide on two or three to offer at first. And for those two or three, we would try to identify a list of ten or twenty companies that we would like to target.” This would be followed by presentations to these target companies on the services that the financial city would offer.
The ongoing discussions are also looking into the question of what incentives the occupants of the city should be offered. Highlighting capital investment incentives and tax sops given in the manufacturing sector, the Ministry official said: “For the financial city we need to understand what incentives would excite them. There is no point in saying, ‘We will give you this’ if that does not change his decision and we still end up giving the incentive.” To avoid this situation, a brief survey would be undertaken to ask prospective occupants: “What are the five things which you think are most important?”
Foreign players coming in
Discussions are also focussed on the process of identifying the list of potential occupants.
The plan to offer the services of the financial city to foreign players could be traced back to the banking roadmap that the RBI had earlier given. According to the roadmap, foreign banks could grow organically in India by opening new branches.
In this context, there is an opportunity. “We need to determine which banks have aggressively tried to get branch licences – that shows their intentions. Also, some of those who have already started some kind of office presence in India, we could approach them as that could be one list,” the official said. The same would apply to insurance companies that have struck agreements with local players.
The initiative is being developed in coordination with the Confederation of Indian Industry, the official confirmed. “We believe that in Tamil Nadu we have very good responsible and responsive industry and we can work in tandem,” he said.
Outlining the CII’s role, he explained that they are also coming out with ideas and suggestions and are in touch with other financial centres. The immediate steps, however, are concerned with defining the “product” more clearly.
“What we are very clear on is that our approach would not be to announce something very big, very huge, to dazzle,” the official said. The aim would be to forge a strong partnership with the private sector and try and take local players along, including Tamil Nadu-based organisations and then, moving forward, organisations in other parts of the country.
Labels: CII, financial city, RBI, Stalin
# posted by Narayan Lakshman @ 3:54 AM 
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