Chennai: After inviting business leaders in Singapore and Japan for the Global Investors Meet (GIM) to be held in Chennai in January 2024, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K.Stalin today urged Union Minister of Steel and Civil Aviation Jyotiradiya M.Scindia to reintroduce direct flight connectivity between Tokyo and Chennai and increase the number of flights between Singapore and Madurai to at least one daily flight at the earliest.
In a Demi-Official letter to Mr Scindia, copies of which were released to the media here, he said there were number of requests in this regard from the people, business community, Tamil diaspora and government officials in Japan and Singapore.
He also requested Mr Scindia to kindly consider these two proposals on a priority
basis.
He said he had undertaken a successful tour to Singapore and Japan primarily to attract investment into Tamil Nadu and to invite prospective investors to attend the GIM the Tamil Nadu Government has proposed to hold in January, 2024.
He said during his visit, he met Government and business leaders and members of the Indian diaspora community, specifically those hailing from Tamil Nadu.
“Many large Japanese conglomerates like Nissan, Toshiba, Yamaha, Komatsu, Mitsubishi and Hitachi have set up their manufacturing facilities in Tamil Nadu.
Out of the 12 industrial townships established in India under the Japan-India Investment Promotion Partnership Program, three are in Tamil Nadu”, Mr Stalin said.
“With more than 600 Japanese companies having establishments in the State, over the last two decades, the influx of Japanese expatriates has slowly increased and I am happy to state that Chennai is home to the largest Japanese community in India”, he added.
He said at the same time, Japan also has a significant Tamil diaspora, in particular professionals in the Information Technology and finance related fields. Resultantly,
there has been a steady strengthening of economic and cultural relations between
Tamil Nadu and Japan and people to people relationships in the form of tourism is
also growing.
