Industry welcomes decision to hire consultant for RGIP

Beset with infrastructural lacunae, RGIP which bestows the status of an IT hub to Pune, this week saw the state government initiating measures to meet long-standing demands of the stakeholder industrialists.

The move has been hailed by the Hinjewadi Industrialist Association (HIA), which has been highlighting a deteriorating road network that connects RGIP with the city. The road is used by hundreds of IT professionals to get to their workplace.

The IT hub, spread over 650 hectare of land, is credited with an annual exports of over Rs 2,000 crore.

State Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, accompanied by Industry Minister Narayan Rane, spent long hours earlier this week at Hinjewadi interacting with the HIA members before announcing that he will put development of RGIP infrastructure in top gear by engaging an international consultant.

According to available data, RGIP is visited daily by about 1 lakh people, including an estimated 70,000 IT professionals whose number is expected to swell further with a burgeoning business of an ever-expanding cluster of IT/ITeS companies.

Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC), entrusted with the development work of the park, is now planning to spend Rs 70 crore on constructing two new roads and widening and repairing of existing ones that connect the city with RGIP, official sources said.

HIA President Mrintunjay Singh said the Chief Minister had issued a set of instructions to MIDC to work in a coordinated manner to solve the problems being faced by the industrial community.