Gujarat CM Patel to inaugurate GPBS 2024 in Rajkot on Sunday

Addressing a press conference, Gagji Sutariya, pramukh sevak (president) of Sardardham, an Ahmedabad-based social organisation of the Patidar community, said the expo will “connect” 11 districts of Saurashtra. “The effort is to bring about a socio-economic revolution by bringing businesses and the general public under a roof to change the image, future and character of Saurashtra,” he said.

Organising committee president Hansraj Gajera said women and young entrepreneurs will be the special focus of the event. “We have offered stalls free of cost to 50 startups and about 50 other stalls at 50 per cent discount to women entrepreneurs,” Gajera told The Indian Express.

The expo will see participation from all communities. “There are a number of non-Patidars among the exhibitors as well as in foreign buyers. We are expecting a huge number of non-Patidar visitors also,” Sutariya said. Sardardham is the organiser of GPBS 2024.

The expo is aimed at generating funds for a student hostel that Sardardham plans to construct in Rajkot with a capacity to accommodate 2,000 students, he added.

The first two GPBS expos were organised in Gandhinagar in 2018 and 2020, and the third one was organised in Surat in 2023.

The expo will be larger than the previous editions in many ways, Sutariya told The Indian Express. “Not only in terms of number of stalls that have been set up, this expo will be larger than the sum total of the previous three expos in terms of the size of stalls, number of visitors and number of foreign buyers,” Sutariya said, adding around 600 foreign delegates from 36 countries and around 10 lakh people across Gujarat are expected to visit the expo.

GPBS has also planned factory visits for foreign delegates to the ceramic hub of Morbi, brass parts manufacturing units of Jamnagar as well as engineering goods manufacturing units of Rajkot. “There will be business-to-business meetings and we are expecting that a number of memorandums of understanding (MoUs) will be signed during the expo,” he added.

As part of the event, Mandhatasinh Jadeja, patriarch of the royal family of the erstwhile princely state of Rajkot, will host a dinner for around 600 chief executive officers (CEOs), said Sutariya.