New Delhi, May 30 (PTI) TMC Rajya Sabha leader Derek O'Brien on Saturday highlighted the Tata Group's presence and expansion in West Bengal over the last 15 years, hours after state BJP president Samik
Bhattacharya said his party would "bring Tata back" to the state.
In a post on X, O'Brien listed investments and expansions by various Tata Group companies in Bengal, asserting that the conglomerate already had a significant and growing footprint in the state.
Former West Bengal finance minister Amit Mitra also backed the state's industrial record.
"After the second campus is operational, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) will be employing more people in Bengal than in Bengaluru. In the last 15 years, Bengal has become the leather capital of India, cement capital of India, among top five states in reducing unemployment," Mitra said.
This came against the backdrop of Bhattacharya's remarks in an interview with PTI where he said the BJP government in West Bengal would seek to bring the Tata Group back to the state.
O'Brien said Tata Group companies had steadily expanded operations in Bengal across sectors including information technology, manufacturing, hospitality and retail.
According to the TMC Rajya Sabha leader, TCS employs more than 54,000 IT professionals in Kolkata and is setting up another 20-acre campus in the Bengal Silicon Valley Hub. He also pointed to the expansion of Tata Hitachi, saying the company, which already had a presence in the state, was now expanding into large-scale mining machinery manufacturing in addition to construction equipment manufacturing.
O'Brien further said Tata Metaliks undertook a Rs 600-crore expansion in 2022 and later merged with Tata Steel.
Highlighting the hospitality sector, he said the Tata group's hotel brands -- Taj, SeleQtions, Vivanta and Ginger -- have seven hotels in Kolkata alone, including two under development, besides properties in Darjeeling, Durgapur and Asansol.
The TMC leader also said the registered office of Tata Sponge Iron Ltd was shifted from Odisha to West Bengal in 2019.
In the retail and jewellery segment, O'Brien said Tanishq had established manufacturing operations at the Gems and Jewellery Park of the West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation in Howrah, while Westside and Starbucks had been expanding their footprint across the state.
Bhattacharya, in his interview with PTI, said the BJP wanted to usher in political and developmental change in Bengal and indicated that the party would work to attract industry to the state, including bringing back the Tata group.
The Tata group's proposed Nano car plant at Singur had become one of Bengal's most contentious political issues after protests against land acquisition led to the project's relocation from the state in 2008. PTI AO PRK
