Bilateral Trade Between India, Sril Lanka Soars To $5 Bn, An All-Time High (27-Jan-2012)
The two-pronged trade between Sri Lanka and its largest trading partner India expanded by over 70 percent to record high levels of $5 billion in the year 2011. The High Commissioner of India Ashok Kantha describing the state of India-Sri Lanka relations at a function held at the India House in Colombo to celebrate India's 63rd Republic Day, underscored that the year 2011 witnessed impressive progress in all areas including political, security, trade, investment, tourism, education, culture, and development cooperation.
The High Commissioner opined that Indian companies have invested over $100 million in Sri Lanka and apart from being Sri Lanka's largest trading partner, India, Asia's third largest economy, also remains a leading investor and the source of the largest number of tourist arrivals in the island nation. There has been a vast expansion in India's development assistance to Sri Lanka and also the growing recognition that Indian projects were being completed in a timely and efficient manner.
India's memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the island nation for construction and repair of 49,000 houses under a grant assistance of US$ 260 million is one of the largest projects of its kind undertaken by India in a foreign country, noted Ashok Kantha while he also emphasized on the importance of cultural cooperation and people to people links and noted that India had increased scholarship schemes for Sri Lanka three-fold with a grant of Rs. 2.5 billion.
The High Commissioner of India also revealed that the Indian Railways is planning to launch a special train named 'Damba Diwa Vandana', from next month to take Sri Lankan Buddhist pilgrims from Chennai to all the major Buddhist sites in India.
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