ICICI Bank to fly 60 CEOs to watch Indo-Pak series

MUMBAI: While India battles Pakistan on the cricket pitch later this month, business bigwigs from two nations will be playing a different ballgame in an attempt to reverse swing the stumped relationship between neighbours.
ICICI Bank, India''s second largest bank, will fly a 60-member delegation to Pakistan, including Mukesh Ambani and Anil Ambani of Reliance Industries, Infosys chief NR Narayanamurthy, Aditya Birla group head Kumaramangalam Birla, Wipro chairman Azim Premji, Mahindra and Mahindra managing director Anand Mahindra, Tata group chairman Ratan N Tata, Adi Godrej and HLL chief MS Banga, besides members of the Garware and Kirloskar families and chairmen of leading public sector units like IOC and ONGC.
The invitations are expected to go out within couple of days, and ICICI team is expected to touch down in Pakistan around March 20, in time, to witness the climax of the one-day series.
"The 60-member team will be flying in a 200-seater chartered aircraft, and will use the opportunity to combine cricket with business," ICICI Bank sources said.
"The delegation will have meetings with business leaders of Pakistan to explore avenues to grow business links."
Pakistan Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation (PICIC), a key development institution, will host Indian delegation and organise meetings.
PICIC is, in a sense, ICICI''s counterpart in Pakistan, since both were created with fundamental principle of spearheading industrial growth in their respective countries.
PICIC has, in fact, travelled the same road as ICICI Bank and is in the process of transforming itself into a universal bank.