Mumbai:
The board of approval (BoA) has deferred a decision on
Mukesh Ambani-promoted Navi Mumbai SEZ following objections
from the revenue department, but cleared Tata''s Gopalpur
SEZ project in Orissa.
The
revenue department had serious reservations about the
fencing of five villages and water bodies in the zone.
Moreover, the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust has raised objections
on the ground that the national highway passing through
Navi Mumbai SEZ was proposed to be upgraded to four-lane,
the BoA pointed out.
Commerce
secretary and BoA chairman G K Pillai said the government
had received a report from the revenue department on the
Navi Mumbai project, but was awaiting views from the state
government and the developers.
"We
wanted to get comments from the developers and the state
government on the report of the revenue department,"
Pillai said.
The
revenue department wanted to know whether arrangements
had been made for plugging possible revenue leakages because
of a road passing through the zone being promoted by Ambani
and his close aide Anand Jain.
A
decision on the 1,173 hectare Gopalpur SEZ, promoted by
Tatas in Ganjam district of Orissa, was deferred in September
last year as the BoA wanted to ensure that it posed no
problem to a security facility nearby.
Decision
on five zones in Uttar Pradesh, where the new BSP government
has assumed office was deferred while two SEZ proposals
in Kanpur promoted by state government agencies were cleared.
Two SEZ proposals from Madhya Pradesh were also
deferred but one in Chhindwara was cleared.
In
all, 24 SEZs were given formal approval and six were given
in-principle clearance.
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