Renault and Nissan halt plans to invest €676m in India

Firms reportedly claim regional state government owes them tax refunds and subsidies

Renault and Nissan have halted plans to invest 50 billion rupees (€676 million) in India because of payments they claim are owed by the Tamil Nadu state government, the Hindustan Times reported.

The carmakers, which jointly own a plant in Chennai, have asked the central government to intervene to help them recover 19 billion rupees in investment promotion subsidies and 27 billion rupees of tax refunds, the newspaper reported on Saturday, citing a letter written by Renault Nissan Automotive India Pvt to Amitabh Kant, the secretary of the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion in New Delhi.

Ghazal Javed, a spokesman for Nissan’s India unit, and Jatin Aggarwal, a spokesman for Renault’s India unit, didn’t answer calls to their mobile phones and didn’t respond to messages seeking comment. –(Bloomberg)