World Economic Forum meeting to begin next week at Davos; nearly 50 heads of state to attend

GENEVA: Indian government and India Inc will be strongly represented at the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting next week at Davos, which would also be attended by nearly 50 government heads including UK's David Cameron, Germany's Angela Merkel and Dmitry Medvedev of Russia.

The Indian delegation, comprising of about 100 business and political leaders, would be headed by Union Minister Kamal Nath, who emerged as one of the key strategists in the passage of contentious retail FDI bill in the Parliament last month.

Nath, Minister for Urban Development and Parliamentary Affairs, being selected as head of Indian delegation which would include his senior colleague Anand Sharma, also reflects his growing clout in the Congress-led UPA government.

The other representatives of Indian government for the WEF meet, from January 22-27 at the Swiss Alpine resort town of Davos, are Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises Minister Praful Patel and Power Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia.

Anand Mahindra, Rahul Bajaj, Azim Premji, Sunil Bharti Mittal and Lakshmi Mittal are among the top Indian business leaders attending the annual congregation of rich and powerful from across the world.

Those invited for the meeting also include billionaire industrialist Mukesh Ambani and top banker Chanda Kochhar, while chiefs of a host of Indian IT giants including Infosys, TCS, Tech Mahindra, Satyam and HCL group would also be present there.

Announcing the schedule for the meeting, Geneva-based World Economic Forum said today that its 43rd Annual Meet, with the theme of 'Resilient Dynamism', would be attended by over 2,500 participants from more than 100 countries, representing business, government, academia and civil society.