Centre to soon free up untapped space in SEZs

Land, ₹30,000 cr. built area to find use

The government will soon free up unused built-up area worth about ₹30,000 crore and idle land inside Special Economic Zones (SEZs) for other economic activity, Commerce Secretary B.V.R Subrahmanyam said on Wednesday at a CII meet. The move to free up unutilised land parcels is likely to be operationalised by the end of August, as part of a simpler regulatory regime that the government is ringing in for SEZs, which account for about 30% of India’s exports. “There’s a lot of space within SEZs, including land that is free. We are going to ease up the process for denotification of that land. As long as you can use that land for some industrial purposes, we will allow SEZ land to be hived out,” Mr. Subrahmanyam said, adding that a similar change would be introduced later for denotifying unused space in SEZ buildings.