Real estate major DLF Ltd on Monday said it aims to invest an additional $2 billion in the coming two years to develop information technology special economic zones (SEZ).
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the ongoing India Economic Summit, Rajeev Talwar, group executive director at DLF, said the company has already pumped in $1 billion in such SEZs. He added that DLF — the country’s largest listed property developer — was setting up over a dozen such zones in cities including Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune and Nagpur.
The government has so far given formal approval to 247 IT SEZs, out of which 109 have been notified. IT SEZs constitute over half of the total approvals. These IT SEZs are expected to attract around Rs 64,000 crore worth investments of the total proposed investments of Rs 2,67,180 crore in over 140 notified SEZs.
Several IT and ITeS majors like TCS, Infosys, Wipro, Satyam, HCL and Genpact, as well as realty majors like DLF, Ansal and Parsvnath have been investing in developing SEZs as the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) scheme which provides fiscal incentives is coming to an end in March 31, 2009.
Meanwhile, the government is considering the information technology department’s demand for an extension under Sections 10A and 10B of the Income Tax Act to Software Technology Park of India (STPI) scheme.
Experts also say that such migration is happening since the single window system of SEZs makes it easier to develop world class infrastructure in such tax free zones. But industry body Nasscom has made a pitch for extension of STPI scheme.