A number of key officials of Korea Land and Housing Corp.(LH)led by President Park Sang-woo, 3rd R, and Deputy Gov. Bhusan Gagrani of Maharashtra State of India,2nd L, celebrate the opening of LH"s office in Mumbai, India, on July 10. (Photo:LH)

Korea Land and Housing Corp. said July 10 it opened an office in Mumbai, India, for the first time for a state-run Korean construction company. A ceremony was attended by some 30 local and Korean officials led by President Park Sang-woo and Deputy Governor Bhusan Gagrani of Maharashtra State, India.
LH plans to take advantage of its branch office in Mumbai as its base to explore India’s construction market. The subcontinent nation ranks the 7th largest economy in the world. The company plans to conduct a thorough survey on the real estate market and laws and regulations governing real estate and construction market to help its exploration. The company is eying India’s 100 largest “smart city” projects while strengthening its support system for general Korean construction firms to enter India.
LH first picked Maharashtra State to set up construction projects in India as part of the Korea-India city infrastructure development projects on a mutual cooperation base.
Mumbai is one of India’s centers of economic and logistical activities. LH has been considering to start its first Smart City Project in Kalyan Dombivli City and Bandra City in Maharashtra State to show off that Korea would be the best partner for India’s Smart City Project and infrastructure projects being pushed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
President Park said LH will do all it can to make its Smart City Projects truly successful in step with the government’s New Southern Policies, taking advantage of its domestic experiences for the development of new urban towns to build a platform to help Korean construction firms to advance into India for various construction projects.
LH President Park Sang-woo led 150 officials and staff to the Cheongju Cultural Project Complex in Cheongju, north Chungcheong Province, on July 13 where the Urban Revival Project is being worked on. They toured projects in progress and discussed “the Life of Cities and Reform” as part of their tour, including a stop at the Urban Revival Project site to monitor its progress and draw up a blueprint for future projects.
The Cheongju Project involves the remodeling of an old tobacco production plant, which was designated in 2014 and the work on the project was kicked off in April.
President Moon Jae-in said in his keynote speech at the Korea-India Business Forum held on July 9 while he was on a state visit to India, that India was of the key nations targeted for special cooperation in his New Southern Policy strategy. Therefore, he said, the country’s relations with Korea will be upgraded.
The Chief Executive went as far as noting that the special projects that LH will take up in India, including the Kalyan-Dombivli and Bandra Smart City Projects, will show that Korea is the best partner in undertaking the smart city and infrastructure development projects in India.The 100 Smart Cities Projects are a major initiative announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he took office in May 2014 and they were designated as such in April 2018.
In an ambitious plan to upgrade urban India, Prime Minister Modi said he will build 100 "smart cities" — cities outfitted with high-tech communication capabilities — across the country. "Cities in the past were built on riverbanks," Modi said at the time. "They are now built along highways. But in the future, they will be built based on availability of optical fiber networks and next-generation infrastructure."
For Modi, building new cities is a way to deal with the country's rapidly urbanizing population while also competing with China, which has made smart cities a centerpiece of its own policies.