The UPA government, in its last meeting on its flagship special economic zones policy on Monday, cleared 10 more proposals for such tax-free zones, taking the total number of SEZs in the country, after the enforcement of SEZ Act and Rules, to 714.

The commerce ministry expects exports from SEZs to touch Rs 90,000 crore by this fiscal-end. Exports from SEZs in April-December 2008 have touched Rs 67,000 crore, which is more than the Rs 66,638 crore in the whole of 2007-08. ?There is a little bit slowdown but we think we will cross Rs 90,000 crore,? commerce secretary GK Pillai said. SEZs approved by the Centre on Monday include Navi Mumbai gems and jewellery SEZ, promoted by an aide of Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani, and L&T?s shipbuilding SEZ.

The board of approval (BoA) for SEZs, on Monday, also gave its approval for an application to merge three notified SEZs of the Adani group?4,846 hectare (Mundra Port SEZ I) and 1,074.17 hectare (Mundra Port SEZ II), as well as 293.88 hectare Adani Power SEZ ? taking the total area of the combined zone to 6214.05 hectare. The total investment proposed for this SEZ is Rs 100,000 crore and the zone is expected to provide employment to 5 lakh people over the next 10 years.

This is the first time since April 2007?when an empowered group of ministers (EGoM) fixed the 5,000-hectare cap on the maximum area for a special economic zone (SEZ) following protests against forcible land acquisition for the zones ? that the Centre has given the nod for a tax-free enclave to breach this cap. Earlier, the EGoM had given the green signal for the same application.

The BoA agreed to the contention of the Adani group that since the notified areas of all three SEZs are contiguous, treating all the three SEZs as one SEZ would help prevent duplication of administrative requirements, do away with the need to create separate boundaries for each SEZ and also ensure that the developers can now build seamless infrastructure connecting the three SEZs.

The BoA also approved the proposals for 11 investors to join as co-developers, including six in the Mundra SEZ. The co-developers in Mundra SEZ would help develop schools (including one by the Delhi Public School ), colleges, hospitals and a 2300 mw power project (of which 300 mw will be commissioned next month. The SEZ will house a railway line, an airport and a port. It will be a part of the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC). The DMIC project, jointly developed by India and Japan , would entail an investment of $45-50 billion. Pillai told reporters after the BoA meeting, ?five years from now it (Mundra SEZ) will be one of the show-pieces.?

Besides, the BoA has cleared a proposal on some technical complications involved in the Essar steel SEZ. Earlier, the Centre had decided against withdrawing the approval given to Essar and Mundra SEZs. The finance ministry had earlier alleged that these SEZs had violated the rules regarding vacancy of land.

Meanwhile, the commerce ministry has decided to give in-principle approvals (for viable proposals without the required land) only to proposals for multi-product SEZs and not to sector-specific or IT/ITeS SEZs.