August 16, 2012
Chief Minister convenes cabinet meeting on infrastructure at Writers` Building, announces new projects
West Bengal Chief Minister Ms. Mamata Banerjee on Thursday convened a cabinet committee meeting to discuss infrastructure and development at the Writers` Building. During this meeting members discussed various issues including to have a new and better Investment Policy in West Bengal.
Chief Minister after the meeting while addressing the PRESS informed that decision to constitute a Group of Ministers (GoM) was taken in the cabinet meeting since the committee members felt the need to have a better and modified Investment Policy in the wake of investment proposals and projects. `We had our cabinet meeting today and we came to a conclusion that we must have a better Investment Policy in the state since we are having investments from outside`, said Chief Minister who added that the committee will be chaired by West Bengal Finance Minister and will have several ministers in the committee. The GoM will submit a detailed report within a fortnight. `We have asked them to prepare a detailed report on the projects – New Industrial Policy, Investment Policy, NRI Policy and Software Policy following which we will place the same in front of the cabinet committee meeting on infrastructure and discuss the issue`, added Chief Minister.
Decision was taken at the cabinet meeting to construct two deep-sea-ports in the state � one of them will be built at Shagor in a joint venture with Indian Railways and West Bengal State Government while the other one will be constructed at Rasulpur under Public�private partnership (PPP) model.
In an innovative idea to develop the small scale retail market in the state, Chief Minister said, `We have nearly 199-acre of land in Bolpur under industry department. `Out of the 190-acre we would like to build a market on 150-acre of land and call it `Bishho Bangla Khudro Bazar`, a place where young artisans will be able to sell their finished products under a roof across counter. The idea is to provide the artisans under the self-help-group a platform to display and sell their products. This will be on the lines `Big Bazar` which will house huge variety of art and craft products under one roof. I know there are similar markets in other part of the world`. She reiterated on the need to protect the art and artisans and by building `Bishho Bangla Khudro Bazar`, they will get a platform. This haat will house products from clay to Dokra art to Terracotta art and even paintings.
Chief Minister aggrieved over the plight of the labours working at the tea estates when the tea gardens close down and remain closed for months said the state government will help them to build their houses under schemes � Indira Awas Yojana, Aamar Thikana or Geetanjali. `We want to provide them with some employment under the 100-days project as they have no work when the tea gardens remain closed for many days and they find it hard to survive. The idea is to enable them to have a social life`.
In order to have more and more investment in the Information & Technology sector the State government has decided to reduce `Venture Capital` (a deposit for those who want to build IT company) from 50 crore to 10 crore. `We decided to give a concession and have asked them to deposit 10 crore instead of 50 crore initially, I am sure this will be an added advantage. Previously, one had to submit 99 formalities to obtain an Industrial Policy which has now minimized to seven`, added Chief Minister.
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