A day after a political slugfest erupted over Maharashtra losing the Rs 1.54-lakh crore Vedanta-Foxconn semiconductor manufacturing project to Gujarat, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is learnt to have promised Chief Minister Eknath Shinde an equally big investment. However, the assurance didn’t defuse the Opposition’s attack, prompting the state government to come out with more clarification and substance to blame the MVA regime for failing to seal the deal before it was too late.

Maharashtra industries minister Uday Samant told a media conference on Wednesday that Shinde had a talk with the PM about the big project going to his native state. “Modiji has promised us an equally big project saying that he did not want Maharashtra youth to lose employment opportunities. We will meet the PM in the next 15 days in this regard. Modiji keeps his word,” he said. He also asserted that it was the Shinde-Fadnavis government that held a high-powered committee meeting to finalise a Rs 38,000-crore incentive package on July 15 to keep Vedanta-Foxconn in Maharashtra.