How do you view the contribution of the Indian community in Afghanistan?

The Indians residing there are Afghans and we have basically no division when it comes to our shared goals and common values. We are blessed with a very diverse community in Afghanistan and Afghanistan without its Indian community or Afghan Hindus will be incomplete. I am always honoured to receive the Afghan Hindu community in Delhi when they are residing here and they come and celebrate with me. We celebrate all the National Days or occasions together here. So, the contribution of Indian community is as crucial as any other community in Afghanistan. They are Afghans, they contribute to the economy of Afghanistan and we hope that they will continue to do so.

Please outline for us the presence of Afghanistan’s companies in India, and Indian companies in Afghanistan…

As I mentioned earlier there are around 100 Indian companies in Afghanistan, they have tie-ups with Afghan businesses there. We are making constant effort to promote the joint business ties. We have begun promoting women business relationship in the last few months. When our first lady was here and the Afghan businessmen were here, we had a big event with FLO. We are also going to sign a MoU in the near future with women business community here and women business community of Afghanistan. So, we are not only promoting the businesses led by men but also the businesses led by women. There is also an exhibition that was organised by us where we invited the businesses from Afghanistan to showcase their products in India. The exhibition was organised under the SAARC umbrella. So, the effort to promote the presence of Afghan companies in India and also the ones who wish to open their office in India are taking place. There are a lot of companies that have contacted us for opening their offices in India, so we are also thinking of building an Afghan complex, where the products will be made available because there are so many Afghan’s living in India. There is large group of Afghan traders here in India basically dealing in dry fruits and fresh fruits sector and this is the business we have been having traditionally with India. But of course we need to promote it and promote other Afghan businesses in India in a more fashioned manner. We need to focus on the value addition services like the packaging and processing.

Please talk us through capacity building and training programmes in Defence and Security…

Well, that is an ongoing process. Army and police officers are being trained on a regular basis. This is under the Strategic Partnership Agreement that we signed in 2011 and it will go on. This is an ongoing co-operation in various areas which are envisaged in the agreement that we have, so all the areas of co-operation that exist in our framework will go on also without the agreement.