Calcutta, Nov. 5: Communist China has invited Mamata Banerjee to visit the country, days after her plan to tour capitalist US next summer was announced.

Chinese Vice-President Li Yuanchao today extended the invitation to the chief minister during his first visit to Calcutta.

Sources close to Mamata said she was likely to accept the invitation and visit China to scout for investment.

"The Vice-President today said he would be happy if I visit China," the chief minister said after meeting an eight-member Chinese delegation, headed by Yuanchao and including the ministers of commerce, education and culture.

"We have invited them to participate in the global (investment) summit in Calcutta in January," she added.

Four days ago, Trinamul spokesperson Derek O'Brien announced that Mamata would visit the US on an invitation from the US-India Business Council.

Yuanchao, who left for Delhi tonight, said his meeting with Mamata was "good".

"China and India are friends and we will promote co-operation between the two countries. We had a good meeting," he said.

Mamata said the Chinese team was "very enthusiastic" about Bengal and the government had requested the country to "explore opportunities of investment in our education and auto hubs".

"We requested them to provide us loans from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and they agreed," the chief minister said.

Chinese bus manufacturing company Zhongtong has decided to set up an assembling unit at the airport city in Burdwan's Andal. The company has proposed to invest Rs 250 crore in the first phase and scale it up to Rs 1,500 crore. Zhongtong plans to manufacture buses in Andal later.

"The delegation said Calcutta was geographically close to China and so it was keen on Bengal," industries minister Amit Mitra, who attended today's meeting, said. "After today's interaction, we are optimistic about China's participation in our global summit."

Mitra had led a business delegation to Kunming in China in June.

In a Facebook post, Mamata said the government had "expressed our keenness to collaborate with China in infrastructure sector, tourism, educational exchanges, setting up of manufacturing hub and cultural exchanges".

Getting investment proposals from China is easier said than done as the country is one of the cheapest manufacturing centres in the world. Investors from across the globe have set up units in the SEZs the Chinese government has promoted.

"In Bengal, the government is against SEZ. How can one expect that Chinese investments will come to Bengal?" asked a Calcutta-based industrialist.