Jul. 23 – India has decided to lower the minimum required area for establishing special economic zones for the IT, bio-tech, gems and jewelry industries in smaller cities around the country.
“The built up area requirement for SEZs so far was too large to attract developers in small cities as investors wouldn’t want to put in money in building infrastructure without knowing whether the whole of it would get occupied,” said Raju Bhatnagar, vice president of Nasscom, the trade body and the chamber of commerce of the IT-BPO industries in India.
Information technology SEZs slated for tier-2 cities will now have their minimum area requirement slashed by half from 100,000 square meters to 50,000 square meters. Along with lower area requirements, authorities have announced that SEZ developers will have to comply to a 10 year deadline to establish infrastructure as a way of attracting only serious developers.
Gems and jewelry SEZs for tier-2 cities will now have a reduced area requirement of 25,000 square meters from 50,000 square meters. The minimum area requirement will be even lower for tier-3 cities where the allowable area will only be 25 percent of the previous area requirement.
In major Indian cities like Bangalore, Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai, and New Delhi the original area requirement will still apply.
