People's Democracy

On SEZs: Stop Piecemeal Changes

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has issued the following statement on March 23

THE overall SEZ policy and the changes required in the SEZ Act and Rules are being considered by the Group of Ministers. The CPI(M) and the Left parties have submitted their position on what changes are required in the Act and Rules.

While this exercise has not been completed, it is surprising that the Ministry of Commerce, through a notification issued on March 16, 2007, has made certain amendments to the SEZ Rules of 2006.

One of the amendments allows the developer to expand the area of SEZ by acquiring more vacant land in contiguous areas. This would mean that the scope of the SEZ can be expanded beyond the initial approval. This goes against the suggestion given by the Left parties that a ceiling should be fixed for the size of SEZ. Moreover, another amendment seeks to continue with tax concessions for the contractors working for the private SEZ developers. This also goes against the suggestion of the Left parties that tax concessions provided to private developers should be removed.

The Polit Bureau of the CPI(M) calls upon the government not to make piecemeal changes in the SEZ Rules. The empowered Group of Ministers must finalise their report and only then the required changes should be put in place.