Kuala Lumpur, January 19: To further strengthen India’s ‘Look East Policy’ around a dozen agreements in various sectors including infrastructure, education, IT and pharma are likely to be inked during the visit of the Malaysian Prime minister Najib Tun Razak’s five-day visit starting Tuesday.
The private sector will play a major role in signing the memorandums of understanding, which is engaged in different projects in India.
Razak, who will be undertaking an official visit January 19-23 at the invitation of his counterpart Prime minister Manmohan Singh, will be leading an official delegation of 200, comprising of several ministers, including deputy minister Menteris Besar (state chief ministers), members of Parliament, senior officials, as well as the media and business delegation.
During their bilateral meeting both leaders will discuss regional and international issues of common interest and issues relating to road construction, education, information and communication technology, oil and gas exploration, pharmaceuticals, tourism and green technologies.
The Malaysian PM the meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday and is scheduled to call on President Pratibha Patil and Vice-President Hamid Ansari.
Razak and the accompanying team will interact with Corporate India at a meeting organised by Ficci.
The bilateral trade with had reached $10 billion and the premier hoped it would increase in the future. Besides economic ties, Malaysia and India have defence co-operation. Apart from training their defence personnel, India, which has SU 30 in its airforce has extended useful help for Sukhoi aircraft which are in the Malaysian Air Force.
Malaysia is ranked 21 among the foreign investors in India as per the cumulative FDI approved from January, 1991 to January 2007, with more than 210 FDI approvals, valued at $1,836 million. These figures, however, do not include the substantial flow of Malaysian investment to India through the Mauritian route. Notable investments include those of Maxis Communications in Aircel and TM International in Spice Communications.
—Agencies