Tesco is breaking into the Indian retail market with plans to open cash-and-carry stores and sell its own-branded products to hypermarket shelves in an alliance with the Tata conglomerate.

The UK’s biggest retailer will invest £60m in the coming two years to build three cash-andcarry outlets in Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore, which will supply food and other products to local family-run stores and restaurants.

It has also signed a franchise deal with Tata Group to supply goods and retailing know-how to its nascent Star Bazaar hypermarket chain for a fee. Trent, the retail arm of Tata, plans to take it from a four store to a 50 store chain in the coming five years.

The deal ends years of searching for Tesco, which suffered a setback in its Indian ambitions in 2006, when Bharti Enterprises picked Wal-Mart as its partner over the British chain.

Financial Times, The Times, Daily Telegraph, The Independent