The government is also taking steps to speed up notification of the SEZ rules by November to facilitate SEZs, which have firmed up investment of Rs 50,000 crore (Rs 500 billion) including a large chunk of FDI.
Indicating this, commerce ministry additional secretary G K Pillai said a final revision of the rules was being done after incorporating industry suggestions and they should be notified by November.
He pointed out that the government would also be notifying the services under the GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services) to allow their operation from the zones.
Elaborating on the Nokia proposal, he said it entails creation of a hub within the SEZ, a kind of free trade warehouse, where about 200 vendors of Nokia will park their products and Nokia will import from them as and when required.
Besides Nokia, he said the government had also approved in principle a 4,000 hectare SEZ in Dadri by Reliance Energy as also a petrochemical one in Jamnagar by Reliance Industries and a biotechnology and pharma SEZ near Pune by Serum Institute, entailing an investment of Rs 1,200 crore (Rs 12 billion).
He said Singapore real estate major Ascendas had joined hands with Mahindra to co-develop 40 acres in their SEZ in Chennai at an investment of $75 million.
Biocon has also made a proposal for a biotech SEZ near Bangalore.
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