BHUBANESWAR: Indian business magnate and chairman of Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) Mukesh Ambani on Monday committed to investing an additional Rs 3,000 crore in next few years in Odisha.
Speaking at the Make-in-Odisha Conclave 2018, the flagship biennial investors' summit of the State Government, he said that Reliance Industries has already invested over Rs 6,000 crore in the State, mostly in developing Jio network and created new employment opportunities to over 30,000 people in the last two years.
"Odisha has been growing at eight per cent per annum, higher than the national average consistently. It is fast becoming an ideal investment destination, not only in the country but across the world. For Reliance, Jio is not just another business. It's a mission to transform India and Odisha as well," he said.
With India becoming the fastest digitising economy in the world, Ambani said, Jio is leading the country's digital transformation. Within over two years of Jio's operation, India has moved from the 155th rank in mobile broadband penetration to being the No.1 nation in mobile data consumption in the world."Our aim is to take the power of digital life to every nook and corner of the State, particularly in rural Odisha and improve the quality of education and healthcare besides providing large number of newer livelihood opportunities.
Jio has connected all towns and 43 thousand villages in the State. Now, per capita data consumption in Odisha is amongst the highest in the country," he said. The RIL chairman said his company is working with the Odisha Government on an initiative to integrate several lakh women in the digital mainstream under 'Mission Shakti' scheme.
"We are taking another step to propel Odisha further into the digital future. With JioGigaFiber, we have now begun an ambitious push in the fixed broadband through Fiber-to-the-home and Fiber-to-the-premises. We are committed to making Odisha among the most developed digitally in India and the world," Ambani said.
Appreciating Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik's vision of making Odisha a great sports power, the business mogul said his company is partnering with the State to set up the 'Reliance Foundation - Odisha High-Performance Athletics Centre', which will train local talent under world-renowned experts to develop them into Olympic Medal winners of tomorrow.
"We will together make Odisha once again the most globalised regions of India as it was in the past when it had established and made cultural links with South-East Asia. We will together build new wonders, which will match the wondrous Sun Temple of Konark in the coming decades," he added.