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Andhra's CEO joins the global biz-bigwig club

Our Correspondent in Hyderabad

The prestigious J L Kellogg's Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, the USA, wants to rope in Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu as an "honorary professor".

Disclosing this at a guest lecture on "strategic services and value management -- the knowledge game" on Wednesday, Professor Bala V Balachandran, distinguished professor of accounting, information systems and decision sciences at the Kellogg's Graduate School, termed Naidu as a man of vision and an able administrator whom the school would like to have as an honorary professor.

Naidu invited Balachandran to interact with the cabinet sub-committee on human resources and finalise lectures to be delivered by distinguished experts for Andhra Pradesh ministers and officials.

That is not the only piece of news with international flavour about Naidu. He will attend, like he did last year, this year's summit of the World Economic Summit at Davos, Switzerland, next week.

During the summit, he will interact with global industry leaders and invite them to invest in the state. He will make a presentation on "information technology in governance" and deliver a lecture on various innovative people-centred schemes launched by the Andhra Pradesh government.

Today, he played host to the visiting Singaporean prime minister. Last week, he flew to Dubai, the UAE, to persuade Non Resident Indians and other Arab businessmen to forge information technology tie-ups between Hyderabad and Dubai. In the last fortnight, Naidu had interacted in Hyderabad with trade delegations from various countries, including the USA and UK. Naidu is among the very few Indian politicians to have got a personal audience with Microsoft chairman Bill Gates during the latter's India visit in 1998. He was also adjudged the 'Businessperson of 1998' by a leading Indian economic publication.

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Andhra Pradesh