Meghalaya increases lease period on Govt land to 60 yrs, hopes to attract large-scale investment

Shillong, Dec 2: The state Cabinet on Monday approved the proposal for increase the lease period on government land to 60 years in order to encourage large scale investment on developmental projects in the State.

Addressing media persons after the meeting, Tourism Minister and government spokesperson Paul Lyngdoh said, “We have approved for the extension of lease period for government land to facilitate developmental projects.”

Currently, the State provides for 30 years of lease on government land. “But, in view of the need and the increasing number of proposals for large scale investments and projects, we deemed that this duration is insufficient to attract investors, who would like a reasonable return in their investment,” he explained as the reason for doubling the lease duration.

“The cabinet through the department of revenue and disaster management came up with a proposal to change and alter this extension of the lease period of government land from the existing 30 years to a period of 60 years,” he informed.

After the end of 60 years, the lease will be renewable for additional 30 years.

The government hopes this move will help to incentivize, encourage and also attract investors to invest in various projects in Meghalaya, especially in sectors which are showing signs of growth and hold promise for further enhancing the economy of the state.

Lyngdoh said the step has been taken to create an environment that facilitates and encourages private parties and investors to invest in the State.

“Now, as per the existing policy, in a government land, the permissible lease period is 30 years but in a lot of emerging scene what is happening is that the return on investment (ROI) is very critical component of any investment plan, so lot of investors consider this period of 30 years to be too less. For instance, in the Orchid Polo, which will now come under the joint venture mode, the investment plan would be not less than Rs 300 crore, which is why we needed to have a rationale lease period, which would encourage players to come forward and participate and with that in mind, we have extended the window to make it feasible for large scale projects, to have from 30 years to a period of 60 years. It will be renewable by another 30 years,” he further explained.

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