Commerce minister moves to denotify SEZs in Goa

TNN, Dec 3, 2010, 04.10am IST

PANAJI: Union commerce minister Anand Sharma on Thursday asked officials in his ministry to initiate the process to denotify the three Special Economic Zones (SEZ) that were notified in Goa, thus putting a stop to the mega proposals.

The order comes in the backdrop of the high court of Bombay at Goa ruling last week that allotment of land for special economic zones (SEZ) by Goa Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC) was illegal.

Goa Rajya Sabha member Shantaram Naik, in a statement issued on Thursday from New Delhi, said, "I met Sharma at 12.30 pm today (Thursday) and within five minutes the commerce minister wrote the order on the very memorandum submitted by me and instructed his officials to issue the notification immediately to denotify the three Goa SEZs."

The notified SEZs in Goa are a 123.2-hectare biotech SEZ of Meditab Specialities in Keri-Ponda, a 107.17-hectare services SEZ of K Raheja Corp Pvt Ltd at Verna and a 20.36-hectare Biotech SEZ of Peninsula Pharma Research Centre Pvt Ltd at Sancoale.

The three were among the 15 SEZs that the Pratapsingh Rane government had recommended to the Centre. As pointed out in the high court case, several irregularities were noted in the land allotment by GIDC in 2006.

Goa had witnessed a long drawn public agitation against SEZs. Bowing to intense public pressure, six months after taking office as chief minister, Digambar Kamat had announced the scrapping of SEZ projects. Despite divisions in the cabinet over the projects, Kamat said 'No' to SEZs on January 1, 2008.

Since then, the denotification of the SEZs had remained pending. Claiming that huge investments had been made, SEZ promoters approached the high court challenging the state government decision.

The then Union minister for commerce Kamal Nath had assured Goa more than once that the Centre would not impose SEZs on Goa. However, on the issue of denotification, the commerce ministry had taken the stand that as the issue was sub judice, it wouldn't decide on the issue. In a statement Naik said, "I requested Sharma to denotify the three notified SEZs of Goa immediately, upon which the commerce minister passed immediate orders in the matter.

Centre issues order to denotify three Goa SEZs

HERALD CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI, DEC 2
Commerce Minister Anand Sharma on Thursday issued an order kicking off the process for denotification of three SEZs (Special Economic Zones) in Goa.
The actual denotification, however, will take time as the proposal has to go before the Board of Approval that sanctions SEZs and no meeting of the board is still fixed.
“We have not yet fixed the next Board meeting after the 43rd meeting held on November 18 and the proposals for denotification will have to be put on the agenda for clearance”, a Department of Commerce official said, adding that the Government has to go by the board’s decisions and cannot act on its own to reverse the decision.
It is the statutory board that gives clearance to the SEZs and as such cancellation of any clearance is also required to be referred to it, the official said, pointing out that formal approval was granted for seven SEZs in Goa but only three were notified.
Congress MP Shantaram Naik said he called on the Commerce Minister who issued orders on his memorandum for denotifying the three SEZs without wasting any time. He expects the formal notifications “soon”.
Naik had approached the minister to point out that the Panjim Bench of the Bombay High Court had disposed off the pending SEZ petition, holding land allotment to them as illegal and as such there should be no problem now in their denotification.
According to Naik, there was even otherwise no injunction against the Centre from denotifying the SEZs, but Anand Sharma had taken the stand that the Government won’t denotify them when the matter is pending before the court.
Naik said he told the minister that the SEZ developers no longer have land with them and as such he can proceed with denotification without any difficulty.