kolkata: The Mamata Banerjee government has initiated the process to take up non-agricultural land lying unused for a long period.
However, the state government is still undecided on what should be done with the unused land of the closed or sick Central government units in the state.
“We have already started a survey for identification of such unutilised land lying adjacent to the proposed industrial corridor which is being developed. The state government plans to resume such land and put it for industrial use,” Shashi Panja, state Industries & Commerce minister said in reply to a query in the state Assembly on Monday.
The industrial corridor will encompass seven districts —East and West Burdwan, Purulia, Hooghly, Howrah, Bankura and West Midnapore.
About 166 acre of land belonging to the sick Durgapur Projects Ltd ( DPL) has already been taken away by the Industry department which is trying to put it for industrial use.
About 191.61 acre belonging to Dhakeshwari Cotton Mills based in Durgapur that has been closed for several decades has been returned to
West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation (WBIDC) for setting up an industrial park.
About 814-acre land of a state government unit at Mangalpur in West Burdwan is also being examined so that it can be put to industrial use.
However, 541 acre of land belonging to HCL, 193 acreof land belonging to Mining and Allied Machinery Corporation Ltd, all sick public sector undertakings under Centre have been lying unused. The Hindustan Cables closed down in 2016, Cycle Corporation of India is under liquidation, and Burn Standard’s closure was approved by the Union Cabinet in 2018.
There is an apprehension of illegal occupation of such land kept unused for a long period.
The state government is interested to resume land belonging to the central government if they are keen so that it can be put for setting up MSMEs or industrial use. In a meeting chaired by state Chief Secretary HK Dwivedi at the beginning of February, the former directed extending SAIP (Scheme for Approved Industrial Parks) benefits to all projects taken up under the corridor and creating a
single window team for handling such projects under Silpa Sathi portal.
The proposed 500 km Economic and Industrial Corridor project is being developed from the upcoming port region of Tajpur in East Midnapore to Purulia – right on the state’s border with Jharkhand. About a query on the revamped Silpa Sathi portal that has been functional since the beginning of 2023,
Panja said that 63 services belonging to 12 departments are being delivered in a time-bound manner through
the portal. Till, February 6, about 12509 applications have been received through the portal and 8402 have been disposed of.