Kolkata: West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Thursday (November 5) unveiled the state's new industrial policy, announcing that his government will buy land directly from landowners and pool it into a state land bank from which plots will be allotted to new and proposed industrial projects.

Source: IANS

Under the framework announced after the policy's unveiling, direct purchase from landowners will be the principal route for assembling industrial land. The government will also draw on land available in existing industrial parks and on clusters of encroached land recovered by the state, Adhikari said.

Source: Nation Press

Adhikari said the route would be completely different from those followed by earlier governments. "The Left Front government followed the policy of forceful land acquisition from landowners for industrial projects, which we are strongly against. The Trinamool Congress played no role in land procurement for new industries, which acted as a negative factor for attracting big-ticket investments. We will not adopt any of these two policies, and instead the state government will directly purchase land from the landowners," he said, presenting the claims as his government's position.

The Chief Minister said land had already been handed over to 33 business groups in the first six months of his government. "We are well settled to meet the land requirement for new industrial units," he said.

From Cabinet Nod to Launch

Thursday's unveiling is the formal launch that followed the earlier development in this story: the state cabinet cleared the draft industrial policy on October 28, with the government then setting November 5 for the formal launch. The launch adds the operative detail that was not in the draft-stage announcement — the direct-purchase land bank as the main land-assembly mechanism, alongside industrial-park land and recovered encroached land.

Kolkata-based economist Probir Mukherjee welcomed the approach, saying West Bengal's land-holding pattern is extremely fragmented, so attracting big-ticket investment is not possible without the state government playing a role in land procurement. He said forceful land acquisition can be counterproductive, as it proved at Singur and Nandigram during the Left Front regime, and that the new policy balances the interests of investors, landowners and other stakeholders.

The policy lands a day after JSW Group chairman Sajjan Jindal discussed investment plans estimated at Rs 50,000 crore with the Chief Minister at Nabanna on November 4, including the next stage of the group's power investment at Salboni in Paschim Medinipur, where Adhikari said a groundbreaking ceremony for a second unit is planned for the first week of January 2027 after a public hearing expected in December.

Source: Maritime Gateway

What happens next will turn on implementation: how quickly the land bank can be built up through voluntary purchases, and at what prices, in a state where plots are small and ownership is fragmented. The government says it is already operationally prepared to meet incoming industrial demand.