Helsinki, Oct 12: For most Indians Finland is Nokia country, being the best-known Finnish company in India and a market leader in the mobile handset business.

But of late, Santa Claus, reindeers, saunas and the northern lights – which Finland is famous for globally – are also drawing the attention of Indians.

A number of young Indians, mainly computer and telecom experts, have in recent years joined Finnish high-tech companies such as Nokia. Finland is home to about 1,200 members of the Indian community – one of the smallest of Indian diaspora groups in Europe.

The majority of the Indians live in and around the capital Helsinki. Most of them are engaged in the restaurant business, garments, textiles, artificial jewellery, groceries and gift items.

Around 30 Finnish companies have operations in India and 70 other companies have appointed local agents in the country. For Finnish companies Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra remain the favourite destinations in India.

Indian IT companies like Wipro Corp, Tata Consultancy Services, Tooltech and Zensar Technologies have a small presence in Finland.

Wipro, which opened a development centre at Tampere, is the first Indian company to set up operations in a Nordic country. The company recently announced that will takeover a Finnish company Saraware Oy – for $31.6 million.

The demand for Indian visas has grown manifold in Finland on account of an increasing interest in India as a tourist destination. The demand is expected to go up further with the introduction of direct commercial flights from Oct 31 between Helsinki and New Delhi by Finnair, officials said.

But India is not a new destinatin for Finnair. For more than 20 years, it has been operating charters to Goa in the winter months (October-March), primarily for tourists.

During the peak season – when it is dark and gloomy in this Nordic country on the Arctic Circle – as many as eight charters from Finland land in Goa every week as Finnish tourists long for sun-and-sand, they added.

Finland supports the campaign for UN reforms and feels that India deserves to be made a permanent member of the Security Council in view of its galloping economy and population. But Helsinki does not express support for New Delhi publicly.

Finland, in fact, does not support the extension of the right to vote to countries beyond the P-5.
 
Source- http://www.newkerala.com