Union Minister of Commerce & Industry, Consumer Affairs and Food & Public Distribution and Textiles, Shri Piyush Goyal today visited the upcoming India International Convention & Expo Centre (IICC) in Dwarka, Delhi. He directed the officers and implementing agencies to expedite the works for completion of the Phase-1 of the project in a time-bound manner.

“It will serve as a major economic driver helping India capture a larger share of global meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions market,” said Shri Goyal.

Development of the IICC and supporting components will help India grab a bigger slice of the world market share of hosting major international events and exhibitions. It is expected that the IICC will help increase India’s share to around 13% by 2024 and bring New Delhi in the league of Shanghai, Hong Kong and Singapore in the sphere of exhibition market.

Within Asia, China accounted for more than 68% (4.1 million sqm) of total available space for exhibition facilities. India, currently has only 0.3 million sqm of exhibition space which accounts for 4.9% of the share of Asia. In terms of events hosted across Asian markets, Chinese venues took lead by hosting more than 515 (28%) events in Asia annually, as compared to Indian venues hosting 131 events (7.1%). In the absence of high end world class exhibition and conference facilities, India has not benefited from the potential opportunities of this development. 

The IICC is a flagship project of Government of India and is being developed to create state-of-the-art and world class Exhibition and Convention Centre to promote Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions (MICE) activities in India. The Foundation Stone for the project was laid by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi on September 20, 2018. 

The project is planned over an area of 89.72 Hectare in Sector 25 Dwarka, New Delhi with a total FAR of 10.70 lakh square metres (sqm) comprising of Convention Centre (to accommodate 11,000 persons), 5 Exhibition Halls, one kilometre-long Foyer, Multi-purpose Arena with retractable roof (to accommodate 20,000 persons), 3/4/5 Star Hotels, Office space and Commercial/Retail space. 

The project will be developed in two Phases. Phase-I is being developed with Convention Centre (60,000 sqm) and Two Exhibition Halls (61,000 sqm) with adjoining Foyer and entire the trunk infrastructure of the project. Phase-II is planned to be developed with construction of 3 more Exhibition Halls, Arena, Hotels, Retail and Office space and will be taken after completion of Phase-I.

A dedicated underground Metro station, which is an extension of the Airport Express Metro, is being constructed by Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) and funded by IICC Ltd. The project site also boasts of excellent road connectivity with dedicated interchanges along the Dwarka Expressway and Urban Extension Road-II, an extended ring road within Delhi.

Kinexin Convention Management Pvt Ltd., a consortium of Korea International Exhibition Centre (KINTEX) and eSang Networks Company Limited, has been appointed as the Operator for Exhibition and Convention Centre for operating and managing the venue for 20 years for post Commercial Operations Date (COD). Operator has been providing inputs as per the Good Industry Practices while reviewing the existing facilities being constructed in IICC project at present, and suggested various improvement based on the general practice adopted for convention & exhibition canters worldwide. 

During the visit, Shri Goyal asked DMRC and National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) officials for expending the external connectivity works and to complete the same in a time bound manner. The EPC Contractor also informed that the project resource deployment has been enhanced since last six months and the pace of project has substantially increased to meet the completion in a time bound manner. The Minister was accompanied by senior officials of the Department of Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), IICC Ltd., National Industrial Corridor Development Corporation Limited (NICDC Ltd.), Programme Management Consultants (PMC) and L&T Ltd. (EPC Contractor).

Once operational, IICC is expected to host more than 100 National and International events every year.

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AM/MS/PK