Just days after Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy announced that he will probe the alleged financial irregularities in major projects in the State, a group of MNCs from Switzerland, which could not invest in Andhra Pradesh due to alleged corruption, say that they will try their luck with the new government in a month or two.

One of the cases is that of a Switzerland-based gold and silver refining firm which was invited by the former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu during his trip to Davos in 2016. When the firm proceeded to invest, it was allegedly discouraged by bureaucratic logjam and other hurdles post-land allotment allegedly due to “corrupt” system in the government.

Speaking about alleged financial irregularities in the past and measures to be taken to cleanse the system, Mr. Jagan said he would go for reverse-tendering of projects if anomalies are detected.

‘Massive corruption’

Speaking to The Hindu over phone from Switzerland, a top official from the gold refining company said, “We were thoroughly discouraged due to massive corruption in the system in the past government. As a policy, we never bribe to invest in any State. We had good experience while investing in gold refinery in Paraj, Uttarakhand, and it’s doing well. But in Andhra Pradesh, we had to wait for years together to invest, and ultimately we gave up. The anti-corruption stance of the new Chief Minister is very encouraging. We, along with a group of firms from here, want to approach the new government to take our plans forward.”

The TDP government, after allotting 30 acres near Vijayawada through a Government Order (GO), allegedly ignored further processes needed for the setting up of the Swiss firm. “We were frequently asked to furnish same details that were already submitted. There was some delay in the name of GST glitches and there was no response from anyone for a long time. We projected thousands of crores of revenue for the government through our unit besides employment for up to 6,000 people at gold refinery, ornaments making unit and other related ancillary units,” said the company official.

The Swiss firm planned to refine 250 metric tonnes of gold and 900 MT of silver per annum to make it the biggest refinery in India, and eventually in Asia.

“We have been watching the developments in Andhra Pradesh and were encouraged by the positive statements by the new Chief Minister who wants to ensure clean investment environment. We will be meeting him before July to take our investment plans further,” the official added.