In response to home minister P. Chidambaram’s call to the industry to counter the Naxal propaganda, the CII said on Thursday that it will launch social projects in five districts which have been hit by the red terror.
“CII is trying to see how we can engage the private sector to have certain intervention in some of the select Naxal-affected districts,” said CII president Hari S. Bhartia. He said that the CII will try to learn from these pilot projects how to work in such places and will later on expand the programme.
These projects will be carried out in Andhra (Vishakapattanam and Khammam), Bihar (Jehanabad and Jambua) and Maharashtra.
CII director-general Chandrajit Banerjee said these projects will be in education and heath-care segment. “The government and industry needs to work together in the current situation,” said Mr Banerjee. He said that these projects will create an ecosystem for the investment by the industry. Mr Banerjee said that the purpose of these pilot projects will be to create success stories, which could be replicated in other places.
“These projects will try to divert the attention of people in the naxal affected areas for better productivity,” he added.
Mr Chidambaram had shown concern over silence of the India Inc. to the Naxal propaganda. “How many of you have raised your voices and spoken in favour of development. How many of you are going to spend money to counter the propaganda of the smaller section of civil society. Are we content with our loss and profit accounts, our share of parties and our daily doses of entertainment in form of T20 matches,” Mr Chidambaram had said at CII meet. He had asked the Indian Inc. if they are lulling into self into complacency at a time when major part of India is in deep distress.