Sandesh Prabhudesai
26 December 2000
Goa is planning to prepare a 'green list' of industries by March, along with a comprehensive industrial policy, in order to streamline the process of industrial development of the tourist state.
On his arrival here after visiting Bangalore and Mumbai in the last four days, chief minister Manohar Parrikar told journalists that his government would welcome service-oriented investment, especially in the field of information technology.
During his visit to the neighbouring states of Karnataka and Maharashtra, he had meetings with the chief ministers, industries ministers as well as industrialists. "The response in Mumbai was positive, especially from small and medium sector", he said.
As regards to IT, Parrikar has suggested that the whole belt of Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Goa could be developed as one hub, working in a cohesive manner by exchanging expertise. He has also requested Maharashtra government to help them in computerising the administrative set up.
While admitting that Goa has always been surrounded with controversies over allowing pollutant industries as the non-pollutant factor was never implemented in letter and spirit, Parrikar has decided to allow such industries only after thorough scrutiny.
When pointed out that industries were shying away from Goa due to 'khandani raj' (extortion) the ruling politicians were involved in, Parrikar assured that the counter-productive trend had been totally stopped. "If somebody asks for kickbacks, they will get a kick in their back", he shot back.
He also informed the journalists that power scarcity is no more an issue in Goa as the state is presently having minimum 50 to 80 MW of surplus power in hand while the allotted power is coming back to the authorities with most of the power guzzlers closing down.
In spite of offering 10-year sales tax holiday and five-year income tax holiday, industrial development in the state had come to a grinding halt as the high court had banned release of power for any commercial or industrial purpose.
After coming down heavily on power theft by the ferro alloy and steel melting units and taking positive steps to increase wheeling capacity of the power allotted by the national grid, the pending list of units to release power is now in the process of getting completed.
Besides planning to approach the high court to lift the ban, Parrikar has also promised the industrialists that power tariff would not be hiked for the next three years. He is also taking all the necessary steps to improve quality of power by replacing the redundant power supply system and allowing captive power generation.
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