Telangana Govt launches TS-iPASS, TITA welcomes the step

In efforts to boost industrial and commercial growth in the state, the Telangana government has officially launched the Telangana State Industrial Project Approval and Self Certification (TS-iPASS) system. Aiming to speed up the clearance process of big ventures, the bill focuses on time bound approvals for setting up projects in the state.

In a grand launching ceremony organised on Friday, Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao announced the single window project approval system in the presence of hundreds of industrialists from public and private sector and top corporate executives.

The legislation aimed at speeding up processing for issue of various licences, clearances and certificates required by industries and also provide for an investor-friendly environment in the State. As per the Policy norms, the Mega Industrial Projects, worth of investment more than 200 crore will get clearance within 15 days and all other projects will be cleared in maximum 30 days. The government has tried to bring transparency in the procedural process with a provision of penalty for departmental delay in clearances.

The bill provides single point TS-iPASS approvals on behalf of relevant departments and monitoring of the TS-iPASS applications will be done at the department level. The District Nodal Agency, State Nodal Agency and T-SWIFT Board will review regularly on the status of cases.

It may be recalled that repealing the existing Andhra Pradesh State Industrial Single Window Clearance Act of 2002, the Telangana Assembly in November 2014 passed its own industrial Bill TS-iPASS for timely clearances to industrial units proposed to be set up in the new State.

The industry has welcomed the move and opinion that the step would help the state in emerging as an industrial and commercial destination of giant industrial houses. Welcoming the bill, the Telangana Information Technology Association (TITA) said that it is a further step towards the vision of “Make in Telangana.”

“The policy, which focuses on minimum inspection and maximum facilitation for the industry, is a welcome step. Government penalizing officials for departmental delay in approvals is the major point where IT Major Companies will be interested to look at Telangana”, said Sundeep Kumar Makthala, president of TITA.

“Telangana new industrial policy framework is providing a new direction to the government to attract investments to the state. The Policy has been designed for the benefit of business leaders, and has made an ease for approvals to all the large, medium, and small Projects within 15 days from the date of application. As the government has created a bank of 1.5 lakh acres of land which can be used for industrial purposes and transferred it to the Telangana State Industrial Infrastructure Corporation, the members of the TITA Corporate wing have started to explore their projections”,  said TITA Corporate-wing Chair Vishnu Murthy Kalagony.

“The new industrial policy with quick approval process mechanism is like a gift to the business leaders from Telangana Government. Undoubtedly, in the near future, Telangana will be ranked as number one position worldwide in business exports.” said TITA Corporate-wing Vice Chair Naresh Ragi.

According to reports the Telangana State IT Exports in the year 2014-15 were around 66,000 crore. IT Minister Mr. K.T. Rama Rao aims to double the IT Exports in the coming 5 years. Major IT Companies like Microsoft, Google, Amazon etc have already shown their interest in setting up their campus in Hyderabad. Many other IT Companies are keen to invest in Telangana.