CII calls for Infrastructure Budget

CII calls for Infrastructure Budget
The Hindu Business Line, 7th August 2009, Page 15

Creation of Land Bank Corpn mooted.

Our Bureau, Chennai

The Confederation of Indian Industry on Thursday, called upon the Government to come out with an Infrastructure Budget annually, on the lines of the Railway Budget.

Speaking to journalists on the sidelines of Suminfra 2009, CII’s conference on infrastructure, the Conference Chairman, Mr J. P. Nayak, said that given the importance of infrastructure, an Infrastructure Budget would be appropriate. He said that the Prime Minister could present the budget in Parliament.

The ‘infrastructure budget’ was one of the “12 recommendations” the CII had drawn up for infrastructure development. One of the others is the creation of a Land Bank Corporation, which would buy land and sell them to infrastructure companies as and when they require.

This, he said, would help lighten the problem of land acquisition for projects, veritably the biggest stumbling block for infrastructure development.

Asked why the Land Bank Corporation would succeed where others fail, Mr Nayak said that the activity of land acquisition would be done by the body on “an ongoing basis”, not necessarily for specific projects.

Asked how the Corporation would get its funds for buying large tracts of land across the country, he said, “from the Government”.

Mr Nayak described the problem of land acquisition as fundamentally caused by the land owner wanting to participate in the appreciation of land value that happens as a consequence of the infrastructure project. However, he admitted that the Land Bank Corporation would not help solve this problem.

Another suggestion for infrastructure development was to “energise public sector undertakings engaged in infrastructure”.

Asked what exactly he meant by “energising”, Mr Nayak said it depended upon each instance, such as ensuring that no infrastructure PSU was without a head at any point in time.

He also wanted “gross capital formation properly monitored”, creation of “domestic SEZs,” private-public partnership in irrigation, standardising bidding and selection process, creation of independent regulatory bodies for each area of infrastructure, adoption of some quick-result infrastructure projects and the setting up of a National Infrastructure Facilitation and Monitoring Agency.