'Ready to help J&K hold investment summit in Mumbai'

Maharashtra is ready to help Jammu and Kashmir if it wants to organise an investment summit here post scrapping of its special status and reorganisation, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said on Monday.

Earlier this month, the Centre scrapped the provision of Article 370 of the Constitution that accorded special status to Jammu and Kashmir, and bifurcated the state into two Union Territories - J&K and Ladakh.

The two new Union Territories will come into existence on October 31.

"We will facilitate them (Jammu & Kashmir administration) and provide full assistance if they wish to hold an investment summit here in Mumbai," Fadnavis told reporters here.

Seeking to attract businesses to Jammu and Kashmir in the post Article 370-era, the border state's administration has already announced a three-day global investors summit to be held in Srinagar from October 12.

The meet will provide J-K an opportunity to showcase its strengths, strategies and potential, the state's Principal Secretary (Industries), Naveen Choudhary, had said last week. The Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) will be the national partner for the investors meet.

Among the reasons cited by the Union government for nullifying the controversial Article was that it had restricted J&K's industrial growth and development.