New Hungarian envoy woos Indian investments, vows to boost ties

Chennai:

New Hungarian ambassador Janos Terenyi has his task cutout to boost ties with India, which he says will be potential great power of 21^st century, and he plans not to be Delhi-centric but to reach out to all the states in the subcontinent by diversifying Budapest interests.

Terenyi during his India-Hungary business interactive meeting held on Monday said he is going to speed up the visa process in India by hiring more people and doubling up the personnel in visa section besides extending the target of visas issued from 4,000 to 10,000 per year.

He said Hungary is planning to outsource the visas  and vowed to make the visa process quicker and better with existing regulation. Interestingly, the bilateral trade between both the countries is negligible one per cent but Terenyi feels it is still in good track when compared to the overall business of eight per cent in Asia.

Having three honorary consuls, including M A Alagappa, advisor to the Murugappa Group in Chennai, he feels the country will follow the pattern in its bid to revive socio-cultural, economic and political ties. Terenyi also plans to conduct series of roadshows in various cities of India, including Chennai, from March 2012 to cement ties with India.

Stating that overall Indian foreign direct investment is $ one billion in the country, he said it has helped create several thousand of jobs and wanted to further strengthening of ties in the 21^st century. “India has already emerged as political and economic power and there is a geo-political shift but at the same breath added that he does not believe in the demise of Western Europe or United States as global powers.

He said Hungary views economic ties with India on three fronts that include scientific and technical collaboration, knowledge base exports and imports which include sharing of Hungarian knowhow in water treatment, agro food processing, climate changebesides boosting tourism.

The envoy said Hungary views India tourist market as most promising and from the country one can reach key destinations of central Europe. He also said Hungary has built three hi-tech studios to woo India film industry to shoot in Hungary.

On the Euro crisis, he said the country has yet to embrace Euro but the ramifications can be felt in Budapest also.