Bengal to introduce single-window system

Kolkata: As the Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government gears up for the high-voltage Assembly polls in 2021, the state government has decided to introduce a single-window system to allot land for industries across various districts.

The single-window system for land allotment will facilitate all big, small and medium-scale industries to set up units in a much hassle-free manner. This would also help them get land in less number of day as compared to the time it used to take earlier. At the fag end of its second successful term, the state incumbent Trinamool Congress government has done really little to in attracting big investments to Bengal. The party which rose to power in 2011 ridding on the anti-land acquisition movement in Singur and Nandigram went all out to lure investors every year in Bengal Global Business Summit.

It claimed that the state, with a GSDP of $155.32 billion, is the 4th largest contributor to India's services GDP and 6th largest contributor to India's manufacturing GDP.

With a consumer base of over 91 million and a strategic location gateway to over 300 million people covering entire East, Northeast of India, Bengal is also the gateway to Southeast Asia and ASEAN countries.

"Yes, I feel that attracting big investments to Bengal has been an area where we have not scored substantially over the last one decade. The problem is that the state has a huge population density and big land is land is not available," veteran Trinamool Congress leader and Lok Sabha MP S ougata Roy told IANS.

Roy said that any big industry would want to set up their facilities in and around the state capital Kolkata and the issue is the land available near is pretty agriculturally fertile.

He said what the Trinamool Congress had gained politically in the Singur and Nandigram movement the same thing has boomeranged the party when it is in the government now.

According sources in the state industry department, the allotment of land for industries used to be looked after by three different bodies -- West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation (WBIDC) for big industries, West Bengal Small Industries Development Corporation (WBSIDC) for medium and small-scale industries and West Bengal Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (WBIIDC) for developing infrastructure for the units.

The industrial units used to approach these three separate state government entities depending on their requirements. Now onwards, the entire process will be made easy by introduction of a single-window system, a senior state government official said, adding that land allotment for industries would not remain a time-taking procedure in the state anymore.

There are about 6,041 acres of vacant land available across as many as 16 districts, both in south and north Bengal, with the state's industrial land bank currently, sources said.