Cameron appoints 'minister for India'
London, July 1: Journalists were urged not to be late for the reception for British bigwigs in London on Friday hosted by a visiting senior delegation from the Confederation of Indian Industry.
Why?
"...because a very important announcement will be made," explained a spokesperson for the CII, whose delegation was in London for its annual summit with its British counterparts.
And so the scene was set in the grand Whitehall Banqueting Rooms in Whitehall when Greg Barker, the British minister of state for energy, took the stage and spoke to several hundred businessmen and women enjoying chilled champagne and nibbles from the Bombay Brasserie.
What Barker said in essence was that David Cameron had just appointed him "minister for India".
Barker did not use the term, "minister for India", but that in effect was what his new job seemed to be.
After he had made his speech, Barker was taken aside and asked whether The Telegraph could call him "minister for India".
He laughed but didn't say no.
"Minister for Indian trade and investment," he said.
In his speech, Barker's portentous words were: "I am delighted to be able to share with you this evening an announcement that the (UK) Prime Minister has asked me to take on additional ministerial responsibilities to engage directly with India on trade and investment issues, working alongside Jeremy Browne, the (foreign office) minister (with responsibility) for India, with Lord Green, the minister for trade and investment."
Barker went on: "We want to charge our commercial relationship with India and put real political capital behind it as well. In essence this new appointment for me means that I will work to increase engagement between Indian ministers and business people and their British counterparts."
""¦I have to say on a very personal level I am delighted with this appointment, a very unique and tangible sign of Britain's commitment to our trade and investment relationship, and I am really looking forward to working even more closely with all of you," added Barker.
He recalled: "Now I was very lucky to travel with David Cameron in his first major overseas visit when he became Prime Minister in 2010, travel with him on his original visit to India, and he made a commitment to Prime Minister (Manmohan) Singh on that historic visit to double trade between our countries to £20 billion a year by 2015."
"While it's good news that trade and investment between our countries continues to improve, with UK exports and goods increasing by 40 per cent last year, it's our goal to see this trend continue and grow even more in the coming years," he acknowledged.
Earlier in the day, the CII in partnership with the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) organised its annual conference on "India-UK Partnerships in Reviving and Restoring Economic Growth".
Speaking at the inaugural session, Adi Godrej, the CII president, was brutally frank.
He admitted: "The economic scenario in India has deteriorated in the past few months, with growth decelerating, thereby assailing our earlier assessments and assumptions so India's GDP for 2011/12 was revised downwards to 6.5 per cent with growth falling to just 5.3 per cent in the last quarter."
Godrej seemed to imply that with Pranab Mukherjee being elevated to the presidency, things could only get better.
"I must mention here that yesterday (Thursday) our finance minister resigned to stand for the election as the President of India, and our Prime Minister, has at least temporarily taken over the finance portfolio," said Godrej. "And on the first day of taking it over, he called a senior level meeting to discuss the measures to be taken to restore confidence and to restore growth. So CII is very confident that over the next quarter, we will see some strong moves in terms of reforms to accelerate growth."
Many in the audience, consulted by The Telegraph later, felt: "Thank God, Pranab babu has been promoted upstairs."
Cameron appoints ‘minister for India’
