An e-minister abroad (part 1): silicon.com joins Patricia Hewitt in Calcutta

Day one: Calcutta
It is fitting perhaps that on her mission to strengthen business ties between Britain and India, Patricia Hewitt should be travelling on BA's inaugural flight direct from Heathrow to Calcutta. Despite BA's air battle with Virgin over sky-borne business travelers, the event was as low key as the flight was uneventful and delivers us safe to first stop.

The choice of Calcutta as the first port of call on this five day whistlestop tour seems at first an odd one. The capital of India's old industrial heartland, Calcutta has been in steady decline over the last few decades - something that is abundantly clear on the short journey from the airport to the centre of the city.

But in recent years Calcutta has woken up to its need for outside investment, and the enthusiastic welcome awaiting the British minister is ample evidence of this.

Ashok Bhattacharya, West Bengal's urban development minister, is keen to point out the city's close links with London. Bhattacharya has just finished overseeing the development of a 750-metre stretch of the riverfront with help from English Heritage and the London Rivers Authority. "We have very good relations with and encouragement from London. It's been a joint venture," he says.

Nazeeb Arif, secretary general of the Indian Chamber of Commerce, is enthusiastic about the city's redevelopment and the support it has received from the UK. "This is about the heritage of Calcutta. There have been a lot of changes and growth in recent months, and we want to reflect this new optimism."

West Bengal is not known for its strengths in technology but Patricia Hewitt is keen to stress the importance of the region and its recent efforts to improve IT skills. During a meeting with incoming chief minister for West Bengal, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, Hewitt promised to help the region find a UK university to partner in the development of a high-tech college and provide business contacts to help West Bengal develop food preservation technologies.

It's these academic and business links which are the purpose of Hewitt's mission. It's these partnerships which Hewitt, whose constituency is in Leicester (an area with a high proportion of Indian immigrants) believes can help solve the UK's IT skills shortage and generate the wealth which India so desperately needs.

But these ideas are not without stumbling blocks, something Pieer Malard, managing director of Sema Group Calcutta, was quick to highlight.

He said: "Time is very important. IT is fast and ecommerce is faster, but we've still found it very difficult to get British work permits."

Malard's claim of a two month wait for permits may well have been solved by recent UK government changes in the application process. But the delays serve to highlight the bureaucratic red tape which have dogged Hewitt's next destination for so long - India's capital city, New Delhi...