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The West Bengal Electronics Industry Development Corporation (Webel) will develop an IT special economic zone (SEZ) at Kalyani in Nadia district within next five years at an estimated investment of Rs.4,000-5,000 crore (Rs.4-5 billion), a senior company official said.

"The IT SEZ in Kalyani will be developed in PPP (public-private-partnership) model on 100 acres of land at an investment of Rs.4,000-5,000 crore over a period of five years," said N.R. Banerjee, Chairman of Webel.

Webel is the nodal IT agency of the state government.

"We have floated an Expression of Interest and received bids from three to four companies till now. We are going to open the financial bid by June 2009," Banerjee said.

He said 50 percent area in the IT SEZ will be developed by the private developers as an IT park and the rest would be developed by the company for ITes (information technology enabled services) operations.

"A total of 20-25 lakh (2-2.5 million) square feet area will be developed in the project," Banerjee said.

Asked whether the company has acquired land for the project, he said: "We are in the process (of acquiring land). It is being done by the land and land reforms department of the state. They have assured us of the availability of land."

Webel has appointed SREI Infrastructure Finance as a consultant for the project.

Webel as a group had a turnover of Rs1.5 billion in 2007-08. Apart from the Kalyani project, Webel is also developing IT parks in Siliguri and Durgapur.

The company is set to go for a restructuring and has received the government's nod for it. "We are waiting for the implementation of the recommendations," Banerjee said.

Source: India PR wire

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