ABCD building, an administration and business center for Dholera SIR. It is the central admin office of Dholera Smart city and all legal works and permissions will be done through a single window within this building (Pic:Nishant Kumar Azad)
Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel who was in the national capital Delhi recently, was addressing industry leaders in the curtain-raiser event to “Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit (VGGS) 2022. While talking about the development programmes undertaken by the State Government, he said, “Gujarat's development will witness many mega infrastructure projects and one such mega-project is Dholera-SIR, India’s First Greenfield Industrial Smart City. A fin-tech hub is being set up and incentives for aircraft-leasing companies are being given.
Conceptualised as India’s first green field smart city, the Dholera Special Investment Region (DSIR) located around 100 km from Ahmedabad, a pet project of Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat is one of the sites of Harappa and Mohenjo Daro civilisation. The thousands of year-old Shipyard at Lothal are now caged into a museum. PM Modi chose this land because it has access to Arab Sagar and Cambay both. The huge 920 SKM area is twice as big as Delhi. Within 10 years of inception Dholera has taken an international shape, seeing the magnitude of the area's huge achievement and as on date the industries are rushing to get benefits of the state of art world class infrastructure in place.
Let’s understand
Dholera will emerge as a “Global Manufacturing and Trading Hub” over the next few years as the city will be the largest node and the first greenfield industrial smart city of the country. It will have state-of-the-art utilities, logistic and social infrastructure including education, healthcare, other public amenities and much more. Dholera will have its own Self-Sustaining Eco System consisting of economic drivers through industrialisation, utility & logistic infrastructure. In terms of planning, the distribution of open green spaces & social infrastructure builds upon the core strategy of creating a Green city for the people. Based on this strategy the guiding principle of Live – Work – Play is adopted. Dholera with its world-class ICT enabled infrastructure provides an integrated approach to urban development which can go a long way in contributing to the building of a smart and sustainable city. Likewise, the ABCD Building at the heart of Dholera is operational with the Business & Exhibition center, the administrative building is housing the City Civic Center, ICT Command Control Room etc. Technologies like these can help businesses maintain their operations in times like the COVID-19 pandemic.
Many more cities like Lavasa in Maharashtra and Amravati in Andhra Pradesh have also come up with the same idea of greenfield smart cities in those states but failed due to being only residential cities whereas Dholera-SIR is an industrial city where there will be a balance between good living and jobs in the vicinity. The industry will need people to run it and people will need good living with a pinch of rural life and facilities of a city at the same place. So, the success is with Dholera and it's going to reign for next few decades in development and job creations.
Giants who have already started in DSIR
To ease the business needs of the client, soil filling is done in two major industrial plots. Currently the land is being allotted to: Tata Chemicals Ltd. (126 Acres) for their upcoming lithium-ion based battery for Electric Vehicles. ReNew Power Private Limited is to set up manufacturing facility for their photoVoltaic panels for solar energy (100 Acres), Torrent Power Ltd. (6 Acres), Chiripal limited (90 Acres) and HPCL (3 Acres) are the companies already made their presence at India’s first Industrial smart city.
“More industries are expected to register their presence in Dholera-SIR soon as the Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit is over. Dholera is the destination for the Genext”, said Ambrish Parajiya of GAP Associate Pvt Ltd, a company eying Rs 500 crore investment inside the Dholera-SIR.
Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs had approved the tender packages for various infrastructure components amounting to Rs 2784.82 crore. Land allotment policy has also been finalised and three plots measuring 152.71 acres have been allotted to TATA Chemicals, Torrent Power and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. LTS with total committed of Rs 1450 crore
Roads Network
Various categories of roads ranging from 18m ROW to 70m ROW are constructed for the efficient circulation/movement of people and goods for the Activation Area. The design and construction of roads is benchmarked against international standards. The entire road network spread across the activation are of 22.54 sq. km is around 85 kms. The use of the latest design software, 3D modeling for design and the latest construction methodologies are used to achieve the efficiency of these networks. Services and utilities running within the road reserves include stormwater drainage, water supply, sewerage, power, telecommunications and gas.
Solar Park
Since it’s an echo friendly city, it will run on a 5000 MW Dholera solar park being developed in two phases in DSIR. Out of which 500 MW solar park is ready to run a green field city coming up approximately 70 km away from Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India. More than 11,000 ha of land is identified for development of this solar park which is owned by the Government of Gujarat. The construction of this massive 5000 MW solar park will attract an investment close to about Rs 25,000 crore which will generate employment for more than 20,000 people.
Man-made Creek
110 mt wide, 15 KM long and 15 mtr deep creek around the activation area will work as water harvesting device and water reservoir for the city to keep it cooler by a few celsius. This is first of its kind in the country, part of this is already developed.
MRTS: AHMEDABAD TO DHOLERA
The Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS) between Ahmedabad and Dholera is part of the plan to develop a self-sustained rail-based transportation system in order to provide connectivity both within Dholera and between Dholera and Ahmedabad for the movement of people.
International Airport
To provide air connectivity to Dholera SIR, an upcoming International Airport 15 km from the proposed activation area is being developed in an area of 1426 hectares of land. Airports Authority of India (AAI) has prepared the Feasibility Report and all necessary permission has already been obtained. The Dholera International Airport is envisaged to cater DSIR & its hinterland and traffic overflow from Ahmedabad International Airport. The airport is slated to have two runways capable of handling wide-bodied long-haul aircrafts such as the A380. Work on Dholera International Airport will start soon. The Airports Authority of India has issued a tender for the first phase of the project which includes the runway, taxiway, apron, etc. The `986.61 crore project will be executed on a public-private partnership basis and will be completed in 3 years.
Recent Events
Even as the State Government looks to showcase the Dholera SIR as a world-class plug-and-play greenfield industrial smart city. The Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel visited the SIR a few days back to review progress of various works there.
Bhupendra Patel said Dholera SIR has huge potential for sectors such as aerospace, defence, engineering, pharmaceuticals, IT, agro and food processing and renewables. He urged entrepreneurs to invest in the SIR, which is spread over 920 square kilometres. “Dholera SIR is not just about industries, as we have also planned to develop a Special Education Region over 1,000 acres here. An international airport is also coming up over 1,425 hectares and the Airports Authority of India has already started work on it,” the Chief Minister said.
Patel further said that the Dholera SIR makes for an attractive deal for investors because it has large industrial plots, plug-and-play infrastructure, low power tariffs and connectivity. The State Government has set up the Dholera SIR Development Authority for smooth management, he added. Speaking about ongoing projects, Hareet Shukla, MD, Dholera Industrial City Development Ltd, said the SIR has already attracted investments worth Rs 3,000 crore. Foundation work for two factories is nearing completion.
Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs had approved the tender packages for various infrastructure components amounting to Rs 2784.82 crore. Land allotment policy has also been finalised and three plots measuring 152.71 acres have been allotted to TATA Chemicals, Torrent Power and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. LTS with total committed of Rs 1450 crore.
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