State has scrapped highest no. of SEZs.

Once a trend-setter in industrial development, the state now has the dubious distinction of having the highest number of scrapped or cancelled special economic zones (SEZs) in the country.

According to information tabled in Parliament, 54 of the 346 scrapped or cancelled SEZs are in the state. Telangana follows with 36 scrapped or cancelled SEZs, while Karnataka has 34, Haryana has 31 and Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh have 24 each.

Of the 196 functional SEZs, Tamil Nadu has the most at 36, while the state and Karnataka have 25 each.

A senior bureaucrat said while the state was the first to introduce the concept of SEZ, doing so even prior to the Centre bringing in the SEZ Act in 2005, no critical measures were taken to ensure that these SEZs were functional.

As it was a new concept at the time, quite a large number of leading industrial houses and entrepreneurs had knocked at the doors of successive chief ministers for acquisition of land for SEZs. There was a demand for SEZs exclusively for information technology, multi-product set-ups, power and port activities.

TOI