Hyderabad: The AP government signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) today with the National University of Singapore on “Masterplan on Ease of Doing Business in AP.” The MoU is effective from April 1, 2015 to March 31, 2018, according to an official release here.

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu began his day in Singapore by reading a note in remembrance of Singapore’s Founding Father Lee Kuan Yew. Later, he had a breakfast meeting with Singapore Minister for Foreign Affairs K. Shanmugam and Ambassadorat-Large Gopinath Pillai followed by a high-level meeting with Singapore’s Second Minister for Trade and Industry S. Iswaran.

During the high-level meeting with Iswaran and other delegates of Singapore, Singapore Governor presented a broad outline plan of the capital region to which the Chief Minister has suggested a few modifications. The capital city master plan will be refined by incorporating these suggestions and modifications in the next six to eight weeks.

The AP delegation also gave a detailed presentation on the land pooling process and various timelines for making the capital ready. They explained to Singapore delegates that the capital area has two ring roads and several radial roads connecting various small towns to the core capital region. The AP and Singapore delegations have decided to meet in the next six to eight weeks by the time Singapore government comes up with a revised master version of the plan. The next stage, however, would be the seed capital planning.

The Singapore delegation included Chee Hong Tat, Lee Ark Boon, Francis Chong, Lixia Ong, Amanda Kwek, Gillian Goh from the Ministry of Trade & Industry, Teo Eng Chong from IE Singapore, Loh Ah Tuan from Centre for Liveable Cities and several delegates from Singapore Cooperation enterprise. The AP delegation includes ministers Yanamala Ramakrishnudu, P. Narayana, advisor (communications) Dr Parakala Prabhakar, Special Chief secretary S.P. Tucker, Principal Secretary to CM Satish Chandra, Principal Secretary (Industries) Shamsher Singh Rawat, Principal Secretary (MA&UD) Giridhar, CRDA CEO Srikanth.