SEZ's

Question 1

Benefits of SEZ’s

Answer 1

• Liberalized economic enclaves with minimal taxes, tariffs and regulations (Levien,M.2012)
• areas with cheap land which has first class industrial and commercial infrastructure (Levien,M.2012)
• 467 currently approved (Levien,M.2012)
• The result is an area with a high volume of output occupied by businesses who export all over the globe.
• For example Nokia
• Located in Sriperumbudur (Aulakh,2017)
• Exports about 25% of its total production to over 15 countries spread over the Middle East, South Asia and Africa (Pahariya,N.2007)
• Employed 3,800 and Undergo perceptible change within their salaries as some of them touch 4,500 RS per month(Pahariya,N.2007)

Question 2

Mahindra World city

Answer 2

• Largest IT SEZ
• To facilitate the project the Mahindra company and the Rajastan government acquired 3,000 acres of land in 9 villages, 2,000 of which was farmland (Levien,M.2012)
• the private land was compensated by awarding small developed plots of land to the SEZ totalling one quarter of the size of their original plot (Levien,M.2012)
• Company revealed that this acquisioton would not be possible without the help of the state (Levien,M.2012)
• showing that if the land was treated as a financial asset they would not have been able to acquire the land necessary to develop, showing how the state unfairly acquired the land (Levien,M.2012)
• Southern outskirts of Chennai (Madhavan,N.2015)
• Laws in India mean that the ultimate owner of land is the state therefore the state can take over any land for ‘public purposes’ providing it pays a ‘reasonable’ compensation to the affected groups (Banerjee-Guha.2013)

Question 3

Exhaustion of minerals

Answer 3

• Areas with rich minerals are given permission to develop on
• these areas, which have provided a means fo livelihood for the poor, especially tribal and backward communities are converted into SEZ’s
• For example the land in West Bengal is very fertile and is perfect for farming (Parwez,S.2016)
• However the government is allowing SEZ’s onto this area for economic gain (Parwez,S.2016)

Question 4

Corrupt government dispossession

Answer 4

• March 2007 the West Bengal police opened fire on a group of villagers and killed 14 people
• because they refused to give up their land for a chemical hub in Nandigram
• showing the extent the state will go to to acquire land
• The project was located to Nyachar however this issue had to gain worldwide media attention before they gave up on that area (Oza,R.2010)

Question 5

Intro

Answer 5

• Sez’s have become the epicentres of land wars across India (Levien,M.2012)