The Sahara Group said on Tuesday it would build 50 self-sufficient townships in Uttar Pradesh with modern facilities and amenities at an investment of over Rs 20,000 crore (Rs 200 billion).
The announcement was made by Subroto Roy, chief of Sahara Group, after the fourth meeting of UP Development Council chaired by Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav.
"To begin with we have selected 10 cities -- Allahabad, Jhansi, Lucknow, Muzaffarnagar, Kanpur, Gorakhpur, Muradabad, Faizabad, Noida and Bareilly -- at a tentative cost of about Rs 4,000 crore (Rs 40 billion)," Roy told reporters.
He also said Sahara would set up an international trade centre at Lucknow from April this year for the overall development of handicrafts and state economy.
The UP Development Council has included three new members -- Nandan Nilekani of Infosys, noted educationist Ram Das Pai, and chairman of Apollo Hospital Pratap Reddy.