Inter-ministerial board on SEZs to meet on Nov 19

The Board of Approval (BoA), an inter-ministerial body that deals with SEZs and related issues, is scheduled to hold its next meeting on November 19, even though no developer has come forward with a proposal to set up a new Special Economic Zones.

"Possibly for the first time in its history, the BoA will meet sans any fresh proposal from developers for setting of SEZs," an official said.

The BoA, chaired by Commerce Secretary Rahul Khullar, was earlier scheduled to meet on October 21. However, the meeting could not take place as some of the officials concerned were out of the country.

In earlier meetings, there used to be at least two to five applications for new SEZs, he added.

Since its inception, the BoA has met 42 times and given approval for setting up about 580 SEZs.

Interest in SEZs, which give substantial tax benefits to units and developers, is on the decline, as the draft Direct Taxes Code (DTC) of the government proposes to curtail the sops. The DTC Bill, if cleared by Parliament, will overhaul the country's Income Tax Act.

As per the agenda of the 43rd meeting of the BoA, developer OIDC wants to surrender its IT SEZ in Dadra & Nagar Haveli, while Ajanta Projects (India) has requested the BoA for de-notification of two zones located in Maharashtra.

The BoA would also consider the requests of five developers, including Tata Consultancy Services, for additional time to execute their projects.

The board is also likely to come out with a policy for setting up plastic recycling units in SEZs.

Direct employment in SEZs is pegged at 5.5 lakh people and the zones have attracted investments in excess of Rs 1.66 lakh crore.

Exports from the 122 operational SEZs in the country in the last fiscal were valued at Rs 2.20 lakh crore.