India’s remote northeast to get Singapore led skill development center on 1st November

New Delhi: Singapore, on Wednesday, will open its first skill development centre in India’s northeastern state of Assam to impart vocational training to youth in the region. The city-state is the first country to open such a centre in India’s remote northeast, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi is keen to usher in development and attract investments in several areas such as food processing and tourism.

Singapore foreign minister Vivian Balakrishnan would visit Guwahati and “witness signing of an MoU (preliminary agreement) to launch a skill development centre being set up with Singapore’s assistance, under Prime Minister’s Skill India Initiative,” India’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.

Balakrishnan, who is on a two-day visit to India, on Tsuesday met his Indian counterpart Sushma Swaraj on the India-Singapore joint ministerial committee.

“Both sides discussed a wide range of bilateral issues of shared interests and mutual concerns. In particular, they reviewed the upcoming high-level exchanges, commemoration of the celebration of the 50th anniversary of Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) and 25 years of India-Asean dialogue partnership, cooperation in political, defence and security fields, trade and investment, cooperation in tourism and culture, connectivity, and other aspects of partnership,” the Indian statement said.

The two foreign ministers also “exchanged views on issues of mutual interest at regional and multilateral levels, including cooperation at UN and international organizations,” the statement said.

India’s northeast is riven by insurgencies and central governments in New Delhi have been trying to link the region with Asean in a bid to boost development in the region that borders Myanmar, Bhutan and Bangladesh besides China.

Japan is another country that India is working with towards developing the northeastern region.

Note: News shared for public awareness with reference from the information provided at online news portals.