Govt’s new policy offers IT industries to set up tech parks anywhere across state

The policy also offers 50 to 100% subsidy in the stamp duty, waiving off electricity charges from 10 to 15 years, power supply on industrial rates among other sops and benefits to the IT industry. The state cabinet cleared the new IT and ITES Policy on Tuesday

Mumbai: The state government on Tuesday cleared its new policy for information technology (IT) and IT-enabled services offering several relaxations to the sector. As part of it, IT industries will be able to set up tech parks anywhere across the state. The policy also offers 50 to 100% subsidy in the stamp duty, waiving off electricity charges from 10 to 15 years, power supply on industrial rates among other sops and benefits to the IT industry. The state cabinet cleared the new IT and ITES Policy on Tuesday that aimed to attract an investment of ₹95,000 crore, 3.5 million jobs and export of ₹1 lakh crore.

IT parks (Milind Saurkar/HT Photo)

“In order to promote the development of special fields such as AVGC (Animation, Visual effects, Gaming and Comics) in which Maharashtra has particular strengths, the state government will provide a subsidy up to ₹25 crore or 25% of the capital expenditure,” states the document issued by the chief minister’s office. The state industrial department said that they would be giving a single window clearance for all IT projects and IT-enabled services.

“Under the Ease of doing business, the state will launch Maharashtra Information Technology Interface that would give time-bound clearances for projects, registration of units and incentives,” stated a senior industry official.

“We have also decided to set aside ₹500 crore for setting up Maharashtra hub (M- Hub) to promote innovation by Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME), start-ups, and incubations centres, in emerging technologies,” he added. To promote the growth of IT parks and IT-enabled services, the government has decided to allow the setting up of integrated IT townships, private IT parks and IT and ITES units across all zones, including residential zones, no development zones and green zones declared by the state, states the new policy.

It has further decided to grant the IT industry a ‘continuous industry status’ which means they will be allowed to work for 24 hours and 365 days a year, without any shutdown unless under some exigent circumstances, it added. IT services will be granted essential services status and Data centres would come under the Essential Services Maintenance Act.

The data centres state will be exempted from the standard parking norms, eligible units can avail of renewable energy under open access and develop captive power plants for data centres, it said further.

Emerging technologies like Artificial Intelligence, cloud computing and other new sectors will get customised capital assistance. The state will set up a dedicated Centre of Excellence (CoE) which would have officials from government, industry and academia to develop the ecosystem for this industry. The state has also decided to provide more Floor Space Index (FSI) to IT companies than what was permitted in the previous policy in order to help them to set up more units in the state. Private IT parks would be allowed to set up ‘critical infrastructure’ on their own like setting up of power infrastructure and sewage lines, the industries official said.