Dalmiya’s IT hub challenges Buddha’s offer

TCS is also looking for 50 acres at Dalmia’s IT park. IT industry sources pointed that Cognizant Technology Solutions, which had earlier been looking at Rajarhat, is now turning towards Bantala. The immediate loser: Housing Infrastructure Development Corp (Hidco), which was asking Rs 2.16 crore an acre for plots at the Rajarhat New Town complex. The steep prices had made even Azim Premji balk. With the 1100-acre leather complex yet to get going, he decided to build a 130-acre special economic zone.

Gautam Deb, the housing and public health engineering minister who also controls Hidco, was, however, unfazed. ‘‘Is land at Park Street the same as land elsewhere in the city?’’ he retorted when asked about the loss. ‘‘Now IT companies want a road right from the airport to Bantala via Rajarhat. Who do you think will build the road?’’ he asked.

State government sources said that several top IT companies were interested in the park. ‘‘Besides BSNL, all major private telecom players are willing to be provided telecom connectivity,’’ an official said. But for IT and BPOs, the park will be a good option to Rajarhat and the planned IT belt of 630 acres proposed by the government in the area between the Rajarhat and the airport, for which land acquisition has just begun. When Dalmia convinced the government to allow him to develop a 130-acre pocket as an IT park and SEZ, little did Deb understand that competition would erode Rajarhat’s artificial value. ‘‘One attractive feature of Bantala is its SEZ character. Most IT and BPO companies will prefer a SEZ to a Software Technology Park since incentives to these will end by 2009-10,’’ said a government source. ‘‘To get SEZ status by paying Rs 2.16 crore per acre would have made it a loss-making venture ,’’ said a senior official of a BPO company. Here also, Dalmiya has an edge. ‘‘Since the IT park comes under SEZ, companies will also enjoy incentives under SEZ,’’ added sources.