UP Government Claims Red Carpet For Industry, I Have Reasons To Disagree!
Ghaziabad, January 11 || I have been reading a lot of about the claims made by the incumbent UP government of their outreach to the industrialists. Like many, I too had initially been positive and optimistic. Three-and-a-half years into the BJP rule in the state, I find the progress and outreach for the industry tardy.
Though of late the industrial development minister Satish Mahana has made some right noises and some initiative is being taken, I hope it is not too little and too late.
I have a few points to make :
People who set up industry in UP decades ago feel cheated by the current policy on sub-division of land by the UP Govt.
When Delhi became inaccessible to big industries, many industrialists bought land in Sahibabad to set up their industry. Now after more than 4 decades the big industry in Sahibabad is also facing difficulty because of pollution norms & now the pandemic. Many big industries are closed or facing closure.
When the big industry is not permitted in Sahibabad, why the new sub-division policy not allowing sub-division which is progressive & conducive to today's time ie. setting up of small industries. Industrialist who set up units decades ago faced so many hardships like labour problem, erratic electricity, very little infrastructure etc.
Today, when they are in trouble the govt. wants them to surrender their hard-earned land so that they can sub-divide & sell it to the industrialist. is this fair? They want to make money at the expense of suffering industrialist. Today a big unit that is closed or potentially working at 10% has very little revenue or employment to offer.
Once it is allowed to sub-divide & sell their land in size of 500 sq.m. or above, there would be crores of revenue to the govt. & also employment generated. Also, in the new policy the Industrialist needs to hold 50% of the land. At an average nobody works more than 40 years. What if nobody wishes to continue the business that the earlier generation was doing, what will the industrialist do in holding the 50% land.
The new policy is so loop sided that since July 2020 nobody would have availed the benefit from it. It seems a complete failure on part of the govt. to get this policy in first place. In view of this the govt. is requested to roll back to the earlier sub-division policy of 2018 which was conducive to growth for all the segments.
The govt. can surely put a clause that sub-division benefit can only be availed by original allottee or to those who have run their unit for a minimum of 2 decades or so.
Our requests are all going unanswered & we are losing valuable time in these tough and testing circumstances. Hope this article reaches the right people and our voice is heard!
-- Atul Bhatia/Ghaziabad
(The writer is a 3rd generation Entrepreneur, running his paint & chemical manufacturing unit in Sahibabad after graduating from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi.)