'Curbs on number of SEZs not feasible'

The government on Friday said any freeze on number of Special Economic Zones would not be feasible given the country's demographic reality.

"The number of SEZs are not important but it is the number of units in a zone that matter. It was not possible in India to acquire large tracts of land for SEZs because of density of population.

"It would not be proper to put any kind of limit on number of zones," Commerce and Industry Kamal Nath said after his interaction with CII. He said in countries like China there were only a few SEZs but each had thousand of units.

"They have designated one province as an SEZ. We had a similar request from a state in India but that is not possible. Because of land constraints we are getting so many applications," Nath added.

The minister said SEZs were here to stay and there was no intention to repeal the act governing them.

"The issue is acquisition of land, which has to be fair and transparent. It is being looked at by the relevant ministry," Nath said. He said government was still receiving applications for SEZs and in view of large number of pending cases it has been decided to first look at proposals received before April 5.

India's great rush for SEZs