A STEP FORWARD: Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy (second from left) at a State High Level Clearance Committee meeting in Bangalore on Friday. Deputy Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa is at left. — Photo: K. Bhagya Prakash

Bangalore: Mega projects with an investment of Rs. 27,000 crores were approved by the State Government here on Friday. Of these, setting up of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) for Information Technology (IT) and Biotechnology sectors alone will account for about Rs. 20,000 crores. The approvals are apparently meant to remove the tag that the Janata Dal (Secular)-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) coalition is "anti-IT".

These approvals were given at a meeting of State High Level Clearance Committee (SHLCC) chaired by Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy. Deputy Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa, who holds the Finance and Industry portfolios, was present at the meeting. The committee clears projects that are above Rs. 50 crores. The proposals cleared include eight Special Economic Zones, which will be exclusively developed for information technology and biotechnology sectors. Six of these will be in Bangalore and two in Mysore. Sources said 10 proposals were pending with the Government.

Some of the SEZs cleared include those of Adarsh IT and IteS; Prestige Group; Dynasty, Sapphire and Tanglin Developers, and Shapurji Pallonji in Bangalore. Jubilant Organosys will set up a biotech SEZ in Mysore. Wipro has been allotted 100 acres in Mysore for a research and development centre.

This is the third highest investment cleared by the committee, after 2000-01 when 88 projects with an investment of Rs. 38,345 crores and in 1995-96 when 27 projects with an investment of Rs. 30,188 crores were cleared.

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