SHILLONG, March 12: The state Cabinet on Tuesday cleared the Meghalaya Industrial and Investment Policy, the IT and the ITES Promotion Policy, and the creation of the Technology Parks Society.
Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma said the government came up with the industrial policy to boost investment in the state’s private sector. This policy is in line with the central government policy and the state’s objective of achieving a $10 billion economy, he said.
“To achieve this goal, the new industrial and investment policy has been aligned with the policy for the Northeast announced by the Government of India last week,” he said.
Sangma said that this new industrial policy spells out incentives to be provided by the government.
“Incentive for interest payments will be provided along with certain components of the GST the SGST reimbursement,” he said, pointing out that 50% of the incentive would come from the central government.
He further said that the policy has been divided into the priority and non-priority sectors and the negative list.
“Important sectors such as tourism, food processing, education, and IT will be part of the investment policy while incentives will not be provided for industries that are on the negative list,” the chief minister said. “We worked out the policy in such a manner that we can promote our entrepreneurs with procurement preference being given to the local entrepreneurs and suppliers. There will also be a transportation subsidy for products or raw materials brought from within the state,” he said.
“We are giving incentives to people who will construct harvesting structures, water cleaning structures, solar-powered structures, and energy set-ups,” he added.
Sangma said the government is looking at employee-related incentives with EPF to be refunded to a certain extent for locals. There will also be incentives for setting up industrial parks in the state, he said.
The focus, however, is on creating employment and the promotion of the priority sectors apart from encouraging the procurement of raw materials from within Meghalaya, he said.
The subsidies would be linked to the employment of at least 90% of locals in the unskilled category, the chief minister said.
He said the sectors or industries seeking incentives will be given space for employing skilled workers from outside provided they double the intake of local skilled workers after two years.
“It will be among the most aggressive policies in the country, designed to achieve our objective of becoming a $10 billion economy,” Sangma said.
On the IT and ITES policy, he said an incentive of Rs 3,000 would be provided for every new job created in the BPO sector. The incentive will be capped at 15,000 jobs on a “first come, first served” basis.
The creation of the Technology Parks Society, on the other hand, will help the government professionally plan, develop, establish, promote, operate, and manage the technology parks in the state, he said.
