Bangladesh has attracted FDI worth US$ 75 million from India. MoUs to this effect were signed between Indian companies and delegations from the Board of Investment (BOI), Bangladesh were signed during the India-Bangladesh Investors' Meet, organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in Chennai recently. Out of the eight MoUs signed, Hyderabad-based three-wheeler manufacturer ARD Group has joined hands with Nitol Niloy Group of Bangladesh at an investment of $5 million to manufacture and distribute auto rickshaws for the Bangladesh market. A $5 million MoU was also signed between Chennai-based Good Lift tyres and FAS Finance & Investment for the manufacture of tyres.

A $20 million MoU was signed between Arma Group of companies and UBE industries for infrastructure, $12.5 million was signed between Euro India Cylinders Limited and Dhaka Cotton Company for the manufacturing industry. The other MoUs were across sectors including textile, finance, plastic, infrastructure, IT & technology, software development and manufacturing.

In his inaugural address, Dr Syed Abdus Samad, Executive Chairman, Board of Investment, Bangladesh said, "In order for both the countries to progress, the future project ventures, which we have planned, will synergise the India-Bangladesh relationship in the right direction. Bangladesh's export growth has been excellent. We have also fought the inflation surge well. Bangladesh needs more investors to grow. Per capita expenses have become better, we have maintained our GDP at six per cent, and consumer attitude has improved, which indicates that these yardsticks should definitely attract more investors to invest in our market."

Sharing his goals and vision for India-Bangladesh, the High Commissioner of People's Republic of Bangladesh, Tariq Ahmad Karim said, "In order to perform on par with the developed world countries as lucrative investment markets, India and Bangladesh should work together. Bangladesh and India are working together at both regional and sub regional level and focusing on energy securities, and with both money and resources being available, India should join hands with Bangladesh."

While setting the context for the Bangladesh-India Partnership initiative, N K Ranganath, Past Chairman, CII, Tamil Nadu, highlighted, "CII considers Bangladesh to be a very important partner country. Bangladesh as economy has been posting consistent growth over the years. With liberal FDI investment regime in South Asia and facilitative business climate, Bangladesh has been scaling a consistent GDP growth rate of six per cent over the years. Government of Bangladesh facilitates and provides all the support to the potential investors from India. With this encouragement there are 270 direct and joint venture proposals from India constituting $2.5 billion worth of investment in the major sectors including Agro-based, Chemical industries, engineering and Service sector which in turn have created 51,653 jobs in Bangladesh. It can be believed that Bangladesh can become a hub for North-East region in the near future with the fructification of many concrete Joint ventures between India and Bangladesh."

Speaking on the occasion, Matlub Ahmad, President, India-Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce & Industry (IBCCI), said "This cooperation would lead to better prosperity of both the countries by tapping into a large pool of human resources while providing a huge boost to the export from Bangladesh to India while tackling issues of trade imbalances."

Among India's neighbours, Bangladesh occupies a special position not only because of India's role in liberalisation but also its geographical proximity complement with India. The delegations echoed that Bangladesh has a winning combination of competitive market, business friendly environment and competitive cost structure.