President Mahinda Rajapaksa ceremoniously inaugurated the Business Forum of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting at the Hotel Cinnamon Grand yesterday. He also visited the Bharti Airtel experience booth and used his Twitter account to send out tweets about the opening of the Commonwealth Business Forum to the world through the Bharti Airtel network.

As a global organization, Bharti Airtel pledged its support and affiliation as a proud principal sponsor of the Commonwealth Business Forum 2013. Suren Goonewardene, Chief Executive Officer/Managing Director of Bharti Airtel Lanka noted, “Airtel Lanka’s affiliation with the prestigious CHOGM 2013 summit opens new doors for the telecommunication industry and the country as a whole. The Airtel Lanka sponsorship of the CHOGM Business Forum is a historic event as is Sri Lanka hosting this global summit”.

“Sri Lanka is a land emerging out of the shadows of the past, and the fact that we will host the prestigious CHOGM summit opens new doors for the economy and a country as a whole.

It gives us the chance to showcase to the world that we are a nation ready to go forth in to the world and that we possess the knowledge, resources and expertise required to take a more active role in implementing development initiatives. While this forum is the ideal occasion for Sri Lanka to send out a clear message that would encourage international investors, it will also provide a common 360 degree platform for sharing strategies and discussing opportunities for wealth creation and social development which would lead to making a better impact on the global economy.” Goonewardene further added.

Manoj Kohli CEO and Managing Director Bharti Airtel will also be a guest speaker at the forum, which will bring together many local and global business leaders. He will be speaking at sessions on the 13th of November at the Partnership Roundtables – on ‘Facilitating Asian investment into Africa forum’ and on the 14th Nov at the ‘Africa & Asia: Reshaping Partnerships for Sustainable Growth forum.’

Earlier this month Bharti Airtel launched an exclusive, limited offer CHOGM 249 package which offered special IDD and DATA rates to users connecting with the 53 member countries of the Commonwealth Association.