Green nod sought for defence industrial park in Coimbatore district

CHENNAI: State Industries Promotion Corporation of Tamil Nadu Limited (Sipcot) has applied for environmental clearance to the State Environment Impact Assessment Authority to construct a defence industrial park at Varapatti village in Coimbatore district.

According to the letter sent by Sipcot Managing Director K Senthil Raj to the Member Secretary, State Environment Impact Assessment Authority, Sipcot submitted the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) report for the proposed development of a defence industrial park at Varapatti village in Sulur Taluk of Coimbatore district.

Sipcot will develop the defence industrial park as part of the Defence Corridor, which will cover over an extent of 370.59 acres under Schedule 8 (b) - B1 category in Varapatti village.

“To achieve the target of contributing more than 30 per cent in the production of defence equipment and goods through the Defence Corridor located in Tamil Nadu, more attention is being paid to the sector of manufacturing logistics and equipment required for the aerospace and defence sectors on the defence corridor through Chennai, Salem, Coimbatore, Tiruchirappalli and Hosur,” an official of TIDCO told DT Next.

“This project is a collaboration with TIDCO and the proposed defence park will be leased out for 99 years for aerospace and defence industries and this project is expected to attract Rs 2,500 crore investment,” the official said.

Further, the official said that Sipcot and TIDCO had planned to set up a common engineering facilities centre in association with Tata Technologies.

“While the Centre is giving more importance to the domestic production of weapons, explosives, vehicles and technical equipment required for the defence sector, this defence park will be able to meet all the requirements as the land area is nearby Coimbatore, which has more than 1 lakh MSMEs in various sectors,” the official detailed.