An attempt by the Telugu Desam Party to show the Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy government in Andhra Pradesh in poor light with regard to flow of foreign investments in the state has backfired.
The Centre made it clear on the floor of parliament that the flow of foreign direct investments (FDIs) into the state steadily increased since 2019 and went to an all-time high in 2022-23.
Answering a unstarred question from TDP member Kanakamedala Ravindra Kumar in Rajya Sabha, Union minister of state for commerce and industry Som Parkash said there was a steady increase in the FDI equity inflow that have come to Andhra Pradesh since October 2019 till March, 2023.
Between October 2019 and March 2020, the state received an inflow of FDIs to the extent of US $ 200.97 million. During 2020-21, however, the FDI inflow came down to US$ 85.85 million due to Covid-19 pandemic. But later, it increased to US $ 224.96 million in 2021-22 and later to US $ 284.22 million in 2022-23.
In fact, the TDP member asked whether the Central government was aware that there had been a drastic reduction in the FDI in Andhra Pradesh since May 2019, resulting into lesser employment generation and job opportunities.
But the Union minister snubbed the TDP leader and said no such reduction in the FDI had been observed.
“There was a temporary dip in the FY 2020-21 which may have been due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, Andhra Pradesh has recorded an all-time high FDI of 284.22 USD Million in FY 2022-23,” he said.
Som Parkash clarified that the FDI inflows into a country (and consequently to any state) depend on a host of factors such as availability of natural resources, market size, infrastructure, political and investment climate, macro-economic stability and investment decision of foreign investors.
Obviously, Kanakamedala was stunned with the minister’s reply and has gone into a silent mode, sources said.