MIDC sells area at park project to BSE, IT firms

MUMBAI, MARCH 5: Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) has sold out half of the 20 lakh sq ft of saleable area at its amb...

MUMBAI, MARCH 5: Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) has sold out half of the 20 lakh sq ft of saleable area at its ambitious Millennium Business Park’ project in Navi Mumbai to clients like Bombay Stock Exchange, Datamatics, Mastek, Aptech, CMS Computers, Castrol, Rolta and Herdillia (Duncan) group for setting up their software facilities.

Spread over 48 acres of well-planned landscaped environs, the park, seven km north of International Infotech Park’ at Vashi, has 32 buildings in the complex, customised to suit individual buyer requirements, MIDC CEO Jayant Kawale told reporters here after the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for sale of 80,000 sq ft to Rolta India.

The park is scheduled to be completed by September 1999, he said. MIDC has earmarked an 11 acre area adjacent to the electronic export processing zone in the city’s western suburb for another software technology park and its construction would begin after monsoon, Kawale said.

Story continues below this ad

The corporation has alsoplanned software technology parks at Aurangabad and Nagpur for small-scale IT companies, he said.

Meanwhile, the Union cabinet has set up a ministerial committee to examine Maharashtra government’s proposal for according soft bonded’ status to the proposed IT hardware park at Dronagiri in Navi Mumbai where units would be free from physical controls for purposes like customs.

The committee is expected to soon give its opinion, S S Thakar, general manager of City and Industrial Development Corporation, which is implementing the hardware park project, said here today. Unlike in the existing electronic export processing zone in the city’s north-western suburb, a soft bonded park would eliminate customs posts at entry and exit points, he said.

All controls in a soft-bonded park would be exercised through financial transactions and procedural requirements, he said. Some south-east Asian corporations too have shown interest in the park because of its location adjacent to India’s modern containerisedJawaharlal Nehru Port across Mumbai harbour, he said.

Story continues below this ad

An area of 400 hectares has been earmarked for the park, which is well connected by four-lane national highways to Pune, Goa, Hyderabad, Bangalore and the rest of south India as well as Noida and the rest of north India. Thakar said the railways run regular container specials via the park from the Port to the rest of India by a well laid out rail track. Mass rapid transport commuter rail line connecting Mumbai and other parts of Navi Mumbai is being constructed and expected to be ready by 2001, he said.