Tamil Nadu's newly appointed industries minister expects no less than 85 percent of the state's proposed investments to convert to actual money invested in the state. In an exclusive chat with CNBC-TV18, TRB Rajaa said that while a few variations from investment proposals are expected, most proposed investments in Tamil Nadu in the last two months, will see the light of day.

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"A reasonable target should be around the 85-90 percent mark," said Rajaa, "You can lose out on 10 to 15 percent (of total proposed investments) to investors coming up with wrong decisions, their financial closures not happening, or environmental clearances not coming in. But (we expect) nothing below the 85 percent mark."

Rajaa isn't new to positions of power within the state. A member of the its planning commission and a three-time MLA from Mannargudi, he replaced Thangam Thennarasu as the state's minister for industries and investment promotion by way of a cabinet reshuffle last month. The appointment came even as the state had begun seeing big-ticket investments worth billions of dollars from companies like Hyundai, Petronas, Cisco, Mitsubishi Electric and Omron, to name a few.

Also read: Investments pour into Tamil Nadu as tech giants, energy majors, manufacturers flock to the state

While Tamil Nadu's industries department has not specified overall employment targets for its proposed investments, Rajaa told CNBC-TV18 that he envisages "a few lakh jobs" by way of global manufacturing, energy and automobile giants investing in the state. "We will continue to ensure that more women get jobs," he said, "Even earlier today, we had a discussion with a big firm that is going to come up with a good, sizeable investment and ensure they set up a 100 percent women workforce."

He added: "This is the kind of investment we are pitching for — even if the numbers of the investment number is not too huge, if the jobs (employment numbers) are bigger, we'd go for that."

Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu is banking on a significant number of these jobs coming from first-time investments by Taiwanese sneaker manufacturers, Pou Chen, the Hong Fu Group and Feng Tay Enterprises. Pou Chen, for instance, is a contract manufacturer of Adidas and Nike sneakers across the world, and plans to invest Rs 2,300 crore in the state. The decision to invest in Tamil Nadu also marks a first in terms of Taiwanese firms activating their China Plus One strategy and setting base in India.

"Even if investments are lesser, employment-generation of 30,000 to 40,000 people in a factory or a unit is huge," said Rajaa, "That's something we're looking at — right now, these companies have already come into North Tamil Nadu; they will be going to Central Tamil Nadu now, and then the Delta districts are also on the cards."

The Tamil Nadu Government has not set itself an investment target just yet. However, hopes are high that the approximately $5 billion it has already netted by way of investments in the state, will grow manifold when Chief Minister MK Stalin and his team visit the US in a few week's time.

First Published:Jun 27, 2023 4:18 PM IST