Patna, Dec. 28: To partner the perceptible change in the state, Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India, popularly know as Assocham, has said it would try to bring in an investment of around Rs 4-5 lakh crore to the state.

“Bihar has made good progress in the past five years under the able leadership of chief minister Nitish Kumar. But a lot remains to be done in the fields of infrastructure development. Our objective is to bring investment around Rs 4-5 lakh crore in Bihar and for this we will encourage our corporate members to invest in the state,” said Dilip Modi, the apex industry body president, who was here after assuming his post in the last week.

Modi made it clear that Bihar is one of the focus areas of the chamber. “We are going to hold an invest mart probably in April-May next year in association with the state government in Patna, where corporate members will be present to identify the areas and projects in which they intend to make investments.”

He said similar invest mart was organised in Madhya Pradesh in association with Assocham where corporate members initially showed their willingness to make investments worth Rs 3.5 lakh crore, but later an MoU was signed for Rs 2.5 lakh crore.

“Now our job is to ensure that these investments translate into reality in Madhya Pradesh. This is exactly what we intend to do in Bihar too,” he said adding that education and agriculture sector were the focus areas for him.

“We have identified 14 districts to set up cluster development such as Muzaffarpur for food products, Bhagalpur for silk, Darbhanga and Madhubani for butter. This will need Rs 400 crore and would generate 4 lakh jobs. We want to develop the area on a public-private partnership,” Modi said.

To check school drop out cases, Assocham has adopted 50 municipal corporation schools each in six cities including Patna, on a pilot project basis, where corporate members would come forward to help out the schools and come up with ways to stop students from quitting their studies.