Landlocked: Navi Mumbai SEZ on hold

Notification of the Navi Mumbai special economic zone by the Centre continues to be on hold on account of the inability of the developers to acquire 1,000 hectares, the minimum size required for a multi-product SEZ.

The Navi Mumbai zone project has been initiated by City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) and is being developed as a joint venture between it and Reliance Industries Ltd. The developer for the project is NMSEZ Development Company Pvt Ltd.

According to the JV agreement, CIDCO, which owns 2,140 hectares of the land, will provide land for the project.

"However, the tender condition laid out by CIDCO when it passed on 485 hectares to the developers, was that land development must start before the remaining portion can be allotted," a central government official said.

Commerce ministry officials said Reliance Industries approached the board of approval for granting the project SEZ status in order to get tax breaks to develop the land. However, the request was turned down on the ground that the company did not possess the required 1,000 hectares for being notified as an SEZ.

"The board of approval does not have any discretionary power to relax the area norms with regard to multi-product SEZs," an official said, adding that the company was expected to get back to the board with details of the additional land, which it had failed to do.

"If the developers want to revive the project, they will have to make a fresh application before the board of approval," officials added.

Officials said another SEZ project at Positra in Gujarat had been rejected because developers of the project had failed to come back to the board of approval with project details, including acquisition of land, within the stipulated period of three years.