J&K's new Industrial Policy spurs Rs 2153 Cr investment in 2022-23: CS

Jammu, Nov 22: In a review meeting of the Industries and Commerce Department chaired by the Chief Secretary, Dr Arun Kumar Mehta today, it was informed that an investment of Rs 2153 Cr was made by different players under the New Industrial Policy of the UT government generating employment for more than 11,000 people during the year 2022-23 here.

Besides the Principal Secretary, Finance and Commissioner Secretary, I&C the meeting was attended by Secretary Industries Department; Director Industries, several other HoDs and other concerned officers either in person or virtually through video conferencing.

During the meeting, the Chief Secretary impressed upon the officers to achieve the target of realizing the investment of Rs 4000 Cr till the end of the current fiscal, which is 5 times higher than the highest ever prior to 2019. He asked them that the same is immensely achievable as the available land in our Industrial Estates and proposals received are sufficient to meet the target.

Dr Mehta stressed on streamlining the land use or change in land use in the UT for vibrant development of industrial sector, besides addressing issues related to different kinds of lands such as jhad, khola, khad etc in accordance with rules. He advised for constitution of a committee to look after the land use issues in new industrial estates. He directed for resolution all the issues related to development of these industrial estates at the earliest.

The Chief Secretary impressed upon the officers of the Department to accept applications exclusively through the Single Window System instead from different departmental portals. He advised them to carry out a random survey of the users of this Single Window Portal (SWP) each month to check their satisfaction and aspiration level and take measures accordingly.

He took this occasion to stress on the officers to publicize their achievements through social and other media. He asked them to make public aware about the big investment proposals received by the Department so far and the timelines during which these units would come to production here.

He said that the land allotments made by the Department should be periodically reviewed so that any allottee found violating any terms be considered for cancellation as per the rules in vogue. He told them to pace up the work on the development of all the 46 new Industrial estates besides identifying new chunks of land out of retrieved land for this purpose.

During this meeting, the Commissioner Secretary, I&C, Vikramjit Singh revealed that during this fiscal in these 7 months, only the Department has realized an investment of Rs 2079.76 Cr in the UT. He also informed that 169 units making an investment of Rs 7096 Cr and employment generation potential for more than 21000 persons is commencing their production shortly.

It was given out that out of 28 new IEs, the IEs numbering 7 and 11 are being developed by IRCON and NBCC respectively and as per MoU, these are going to be completed by March 2024.

Moreover, it was given out that the Single Window Portal onboards 182 services across 19 departments, which are PSGA compliant besides being integrated with national portal, RAS, eUnnat, DigiLocker, Umang, Sandes, NGDRS, e-Abghari, Vahan portals for ensuring ‘Ease of Doing Business’ in the UT.

Later on the Chief Secretary also inaugurated the Online NOC's and Private Land Bank Modules under the Single Window Portal that would greatly help the industrial units to seek NOCs from different departments or buy land patches online without having to physically visit offices or meet the buyers till final settlements are made.