Govt gives more time to 30 SEZ developers to execute proj

The government has given six months to one year more time to as many as 30 special economic zone developers including Tata Consultancy Services and Parsvnath to execute their projects.

The decision was taken by an inter-ministerial Board of Approval (BoA) chaired by Commerce Secretary S R Rao in its meeting on November 8.

"The Board after deliberations, extended the validity of the formal approval to the requests for extensions beyond fifth year for a period of one year and those beyond sixth year for a period of 6 months from the date of expiry of last extension," minutes of the meeting said.

As many as 30 SEZs have been given more time to execute their projects. Posco-India Pvt Ltd, Unitech Infracon and Lodha Dwellers have also requested for additional time to implement their projects.

The developers had cited reasons like global meltdown and fluctuating market conditions for delay in completion of the projects.

Tata Consultancy Ltd got extension of one year till December 13, 2014 for its IT/ITES in Kolkata. On the other hand, Parsvnath Infra Ltd got six more months for bio-technology SEZ in Andhra Pradesh.

"The Board after deliberations extended the validity of the formal approval (for Parsvnath) up to six months from November 8, 2013 i.e till 8th May, 2014," the minutes said adding Posco-India Pvt Ltd too gets one more year time.

The board also approved two proposals - Kerala State IT Infrastructure Ltd  and Transcendent Developers - for setting up of IT zones.

SEZs, which were once major vehicles for investment and export promotion, started losing sheen after the global meltdown and imposition of minimum alternate tax.

However, the government is taking steps to revive interest of investors in SEZs. Recently, it had unveiled a package of reforms including easing of land norms to revive investments in SEZs.