Uttar Pradesh government has acquired nearly 3,500 acres of land for its flagship defence manufacturing corridor project that is estimated to attract public and private sector investments to the tune of Rs 20,000 crore.
“While we have already acquired 3,500 acres land near Jhansi for the proposed defence manufacturing corridor, similar steps are in the pipeline at other places,” UP’s Industrial Development Minister Satish Mahana said on Wednesday.
In the recent past, the Yogi Adityanath government has speeded up the process for acquiring land for the defence corridor as UP will be hosting the 11th National Defence Expo in Lucknow between February 5 and 8 this year.
Top defence manufacturers from the USA, Russia, Australia, Israel, Germany and other countries are expected to participate in the event, which is being organised in the state capital on the initiative of Defence Minister and local MP Rajnath Singh.
During his recent visit to Lucknow, Singh had said that this edition of Defence Expo would be the largest in terms of exhibition area and number of national and international participants, apart from the value of Memorandum of Understandings (MoU) expected to be signed.
On February 15, 2019, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had laid the foundation of the Defence Corridor in Jhansi district and announced the setting up of Defence Corridor at the inauguration ceremony of UP Investors’ Summit in Lucknow on 21 February, 2018.
The defence manufacturing corridor is expected to create about 2,50,000 new job opportunities.
India is the world’s largest military hardware importer and among top military spenders. For meeting modernisation needs of he Armed forces, India will acquire equipment worth US $250 billion by 2027.
However, the current delivery capacity of domestic defence sector is merely US $75-80 billion annually, indicating huge potential for indigenous industry.
On November 27, 2019, a five-member delegation led by Director of the UK-based Defence and Security Organisation (DSO) in the Department for International Trade (DIT), Mark Goldsack, had visited Lucknow and evinced interest to invest in UP Defence Corridor, which spans six nodes at Aligarh, Agra, Jhansi, Kanpur, Lucknow and Chitrakoot.
Meanwhile, Mahana inaugurated Manthan’’, a two-day brainstorming and leadership development programme for UP’s top bureaucrats, being held in association with Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow.
The minister noted that in view of the state targeting to become a 1-trillion dollar economy by 2024, it was imperative for UP to spur industrial development.
