Marathwada soon to have defence mfg zone: Minister

Aurangabad: Nearly a dozen industrialists have shown interest in investing in the defence manufacturing zone that will soon come in the backward Marathwada region, state industries minister Subhash Desai said here Thursday.

"A defence manufacturing zone will soon come up in Marathwada and about 10 reputed industrialists have approached the state requesting to give the projects a fillip," Desai said, speaking at the inauguration of the state's largest food processing park at Paithan near here.

The minister added that the defence manufacturing zones are a "win-win" for both farmers and the industry.

The state government is eyeing investments of over USD 2 billion in the defence and aerospace sectors over the next five years which will create 1 lakh jobs. It launched a dedicated defence and aerospace production policy in February eyeing the same.

The food processing park is spread over 102 acres and was inaugurated by Union food processing minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal.

She said only a tenth of the total food production is processed at present in the country, leading to a lot of wastage and stressed that investments in the food processing sector will help increase the income of farmers.

Blaming the previous UPA government for not doing anything on this front on the ground to set up such parks, she claimed that on the contrary, the NDA government has already inaugurated 15 of the 42 planned parks and that the remaining ones will be commissioned in the next year itself.

The park at Paithan is the third in Maharashtra and will be procuring maize from 500 farmers initially, which will soon be scaled up to 5,000 farmers, she said.

Kaur also said her party Akali Dal's tie-up with the BJP will continue for the next general elections.

Accusing Congress president Rahul Gandhi of "trying to create unrest in Punjab" (in the name of rising drug abuse allegations) she said in fact the menacing business is flourishing right under the present Congress government headed by Capt Amarinder Singh.

State minister Desai also pitched for having textile parks at par with the food processing parks.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.