BHUBANESWAR: The government has decided to formulate a policy on Public Private Participation (PPP) in order to smoothen the process of investment by private firms in infrastructure developments in the State.

If the policy comes into force, the State would be the first in the country to have such distinct guidelines on PPP, State Development Commission R.N. Bohidar said here on Saturday.

A high-level meeting chaired by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik here resolved to strengthen the existing PPP Cell by recruiting experts from finance, engineering, legal and management streams.

Support team

"Despite the fact that various consultancy groups would be involved in the process of conceptualising PPP projects, our experts, who will be working under the purview of the policy, will play a role of support team," Special Secretary of PPP Parag Gupta told reporters here.

He said the cell would mainly interact with the Planning Commission and the Department of Economic Affairs. The cell would explore opportunities in Union Government schemes for funding, which would fill the viability gap of a particular project, Mr. Gupta said.

He said generally the Central Government provided 20 per cent of total project cost to make a project viable while the State government could go up to 40 per cent investment in a PPP project. If private firms evinced more interest in a particular project, the State might minimise its participation, Mr. Gupta added. The Special Secretary said the State government was working on 32 PPP projects, which entailed an investment of Rs. 13,000 crores. Most of the projects are in road, railway, port, urban development and tourism sectors.

Till the cell was strengthened, the Orissa Industrial Infrastructure Development Cooperation would provide necessary assistance to the PPP Cell.

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