The engagement with HD Hyundai intensified with meetings with key personnel in February 2025 and this illustrated how in principle every serious investment promotion effort must internalise. Large investors require absolute confidentiality, as premature disclosure can affect stock valuations and jeopardise transactions built over years. Tamil Nadu’s shipbuilding policy was simultaneously prepared to complement the then imminent Union Government’s national framework, ready to be released the moment the national policy was announced thus mirroring the approach taken with the Electronics Components Manufacturing Scheme.
The MoU was formalised at the
#TNRising event, followed by a detailed engagement in Korea in January 2026 where HD Hyundai shared the full massive scale of their vision for future of NSHIP TN and the proposed Tamil Nadu facility.
Since model code was in place MD Guidance TN attended the formal signing between NSHIP TN (National Shipbuilding & Heavy Industries Park Tamil Nadu), Sagarmala Finance Corporation Ltd. (SMFCL) of India and HD Hyundai which was timed to be a part of the summit held between South Korean President Thiru.Lee Jae Myung and Indian Prime Minister Thiru.Narendra Modi in New Delhi in April 2026.
Tamil Nadu’s shipbuilding story carries broader lessons for how industrial strategy should be conducted. Sectors of this complexity are not won through reactive policy or opportunistic pitching. They are won through early conviction, sustained institutional effort, intelligent use of diplomatic channels and the discipline to build a proposition quietly before presenting it publicly.
The foundation has been laid by then CM Honourable Thiru M.K.Stalin. We must now build on it with the same rigour and long-term commitment, ensuring Tamil Nadu’s maritime ambitions translate into lasting industrial capacity, deep employment generation and a supply chain ecosystem that benefits the broader regional economy.
I reiterate my leaders words that when it comes to the growth of the state we must work as one cutting across political lines. The state of Tamil Nadu will always cherish the unique path breaking
#DravidianModel governance of DMK Leader Thiru. MK Stalin avargal. He will forever remain the best CM that TN has seen under whose rule industry and people thrived with the economy reaching newer greater heights every single day🙏🏾
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