Bengal to develop 'theme townships'

West Bengal will soon coming up with townships in Rajarhat near Kolkata and the districts of Bolpur, Asansol and Kalyani, based on themes like culture and industry, a senior state official said Saturday.

"After the roll-out of the plan of township development, we have received 15 proposals from private players showing interest," Principal Secretary, Urban Development Debashis Sen told media persons on the sidelines of an event organised by Confederation of Indian Industry here.

"Of the proposals, two have already been sanctioned for the outskirts in Rajarhat," Sen added.

The two theme townships to be developed by private sector would attract investment worth Rs. 4,000 crore.

The first township in North 24 Parganas district will be based on the theme of innovation and the other will have the theme of tourism. These will be developed on the public-private partnership model.

While innovation township will focus on development of new ideas and technology to empower industrial development and facilitate research, the tourism township will focus on attracting tourists to Bengal and focus on the hospitality sector.

Sen said theme-based township development is compulsory as per the state policy.

"Apart from the Rajarhat projects, investors have shown interest in developing 129 acres of land in Bolpur, 50 acres of land in Kalyani and 52 acres of land in Asansol into townships," he said.

The Bolpur project will have the "cultural theme" in line with the tourism initiative and Kalyani will be based on "analytics theme" again in line with the state's quest to build Bengal into an educational centre.

The theme for Asansol will be "industrial" as the area is rich in mineral deposits and houses industrial projects in the vicinity.

He said the state government will provide all facilities to private township developers.

However, they have to ensure that 25 percent of the allotted land is used of housing the economic backward classes in the society by constructing budget apartments and another 25 percent of the area has to be used to develop the economy.

"Twenty-five percent of the land has to be used for business purposes by either developing commerce or industries which will generate employment," he said.

Also, the land acquisition to be done for the development of townships has to be done by the developer and the state will not play any role. The minimum land ceiling area for the same is 50 acres.