Cabinet approves 'freehold' of land given to Infosys

Kolkata: The state Cabinet on Friday approved the proposal of giving "freehold" on the 50-acre land in New Town to Infosys with 51 percent of the plot for IT and ITeS services.

A few days ago Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had announced that Infosys is going to invest in the state in which there will be generation of around 1,000 jobs.

On Friday after the Cabinet meeting, Partha Chatterjee, the state Education minister, said: "The Cabinet has approved the proposal of giving freehold on the plot. Earlier, the land was given to the IT giant on lease for 99 years and another

condition was that it has to utilise 75 percent of the plot for IT services. Now, it has been decided that IT and ITeS services will be on 51 per cent of the plot where they will be initially invest Rs 100 crore and it will create 1,000 job opportunities."

It was later learnt from sources that though the entire 50-acre plot is given on "free hold", the 51 percent of it that has to be used for IT services is non-transferable while the IT giant can utilise the remaining 49 percent as per its necessity.

The unit of the IT giant in New Town will start functioning within 15 months after getting the necessary clearances from HIDCO to initiate the necessary construction work.

The land at New Town was allotted to Infosys on November 11, 2010 on lease for 99 years. Later, necessary documentations related to the plot were done on November 18 in 2011 after the change of guard in the state.

It was in July last year when the IT giant finally gave Rs 50 crore for the land and the remaining Rs 25 crore was given in December 2016.

It may be mentioned that Infosys had announced the initial investment of Rs 100 crore in the state despite Special Economic Zone (SEZ) status was not given.

Infosys authorities had written to the state Information Technology (IT) department a few weeks ago expressing its willingness to start investing.

Setting up of a unit of the IT giant in Bengal has come up as a major development and according to IT experts, more such companies will be gradually investing in Bengal.