Govt to take up 32 FDI proposals this week

The government is likely to decide this week on 32 foreign direct investment (FDI) proposals, including those of Sesa Goa and Mahindra and Mahindra.

'The 177th meeting of the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) is scheduled to be held on Friday, June 1,' the finance ministry said.

As per the agenda paper of the meeting, 19 applications have fresh proposals including that of Sesa Goa, Pfizer and M&M. Three are those requests on which decisions were deferred in the earlier FIPB meetings and five are amended proposals.

FDI request of G4S Secure Solutions, decision on which have been deferred in the previous meetings of the FIPB, is also on the agenda.

India allows FDI in most of the sectors through automatic route, barring in certain sensitive segments like telecom and defence, where FIPB clearance is required.

The country received $8.1 billion in FDI in March, the highest ever monthly inflows. Cumulative FDI inflows for the fiscal 2011-12 amounted to $36.50 billion.

While inbound FDI is on the rise, Indian corporates too have been increasing their investments in foreign countries.

According to the latest RBI data, Indian companies invested $2.67 billion in different countries in April.

With an aim at increasing FDI inflows, the government has been easing and streamlining the procedure for foreign investment and also recently allowed FIIs to invest up to 23 per cent in commodity exchanges through automatic route.

FIPB is headed by Economic Affairs Secretary R Gopalan.