Nepal-India Chamber of Commerce & Industry (NICCI) welcomed newly appointed Nepali Ambassador to India Shankar Sharma at NICCI Secretariat, Narayanchaur, Naxal today.
Shreejana Rana welcomed Ambassador Sharma and briefed about the formation of NICCI in 1993 with the objective of promotion and facilitation to Nepal-India Investment and cooperation for the economic development of the country, read a statement issued by the NICCI.
Rana further informed Ambassador Sharma that NICCI has been working on Coffee Table Book and website for the promotion of Nepal-India Cross-border Religious Circuits and very soon it will be published and launched.
Rana requested Sharma for support on this so as to have ownership as it is the promotion of the tourism of both the countries.
Secretary General RB Rauniar also shared the issues related to Nepal-India Trade & Transit in which Sharma could play and important role to resolve the issues like, documents to be presented in custom on import via transshipment and via road transport where there is no uniformity, development of infrastructure in Indian side custom (especially at Panitanki custom at Indian side). Another issue is to connect rail connectivity to Kathmandu from Birjung which may cut down the logistic cost while importing the goods, the statement further read.
NICCI Treasurer Ghanendra Lal Pradhan, also put his suggestion to Ambassador Sharma that since Hydropower is the area where big investment could come as now the investors from both the countries have interest in water so it won’t be an issue to convince big investors there in India. That is why, Pradhan requested Ambassador Sharma to look into this and if could convince 4-5 big investors there in India that would be a great help for the development of the Hydropower sector of the country, according to the statement.
NICCI Vice President Sunil KC also briefed newly appointed Nepali Ambassador Sharma about the programs being planned by NICCI like Partnership Summit to bring investors in Nepal as an annual event so as to develop Nepal as an investment destination like in 90’s era and Kathmandu-Kolkata Forum (K2K Forum) as to bring stakeholders from both the countries and discuss on issues so that the way forward could be identified.
Saibal Ghosh, Convener of Indian Business Forum and Vice President of NICCI also shared his views that Investing in Nepal is good enough even today compared to other countries as there we have low corporate tax and cheap labor available here in Nepal though there has been few bottleneck like repatriation issue, re-investment issue and IPR and Trademark issues.
