Mukesh Ambani, Azim Premji and Gautam Adani part of PM's business delegation to Japan

BANGALORE: The who's who of India Inc. will accompany prime minister Narendra Modi on his maiden visit to Japan on Saturday. While Modi has visited Brazil for a BRICs summit and neighboring countries like Bhutan and Nepal, this will be his first official visit to a front — line, industrialized nation with which he shares a warm rapport.

According to sources, the prime minister personally handpicked the dozen-odd industrialists and senior business executives from a list of 50 that had been submitted to him by his office. Forming part of the business delegation are: Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries, Gautam Adani, chairman of the Adani group, Dilip Shanghvi, chairman and managing director of Sun Pharmaceuticals, Azim Premji, chairman of Wipro, Chanda Kochhar, managing director and CEO of ICICI Bank, Shashi Ruia, Chairman of Essar Group, S Ramadorai, vice chairman of TCS and an adviser to the prime minister in the National Council on Skill Development, Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, chairman and managing director of Biocon, K Venkataramanan, chief executive officer and managing director of Larsen & Toubro, D K Sarraf, chairman and managing director of ONGC and Sunil Mittal, chairman and group CEO of Bharti Enterprises.

They represent a mix of manufacturing and services with significant representation being given to the technology sector.

Narendra Modi, who in his Independence Day speech had exhorted the world to come manufacture in India, is obviously keen on attracting serious Japanese investment dollars to the country. The big Japanese car and electronics makers are heavy investors in China and it wouldn't hurt India at all if some of those bulge bracket investments could be persuaded to flow into India.