Land is a State subject. Land for Special Economic Zones (SEZs) is made available by the State Governments as per their respective policy and procedures. State Governments have been advised that in case of land acquisition for SEZs, first priority should be for acquisition of waste and barren land and if necessary single crop agricultural land could be acquired for the SEZs.  If perforce a portion of double cropped agricultural land has to be acquired to meet the minimum area requirements, especially for multi-product SEZs, the same should not exceed 10% of the total land required for the SEZ.  The Board of Approval for SEZs only considers those proposals, which have been duly recommended by the State Government.  Further, the State Governments have been informed on 15^th June, 2007 that the Board of Approval will not approve any SEZs where the State Governments have carried out or propose to carry out compulsory acquisition of land for such SEZs after 5^th April, 2007. 

 A Statement showing the State/UT-wise, total notified land area, area utilized and lying vacant in Processing Area of 365 notified SEZs is given below:

States/UT-wise area of notified Special Economic Zones (In hectares)
	(Up to 13.03.2015)
Sl. No.	States/UT	Total Area Notified	Total Area Utilized	Area lying Vacant in Processing Area
1	Andhra Pradesh	11187.06	4493.96	2213.45
2	Chandigarh	58.46	23.62	34.84
3	Chhattisgarh	101.28	22.04	79.24
4	Goa	249.48	0	249.48
5	Gujarat	12382.83	6818.58	4795.29
6	Haryana	415.49	36.57	293.69
7	Jharkhand	16.42	0	16.42
8	Karnataka	2302.74	841.83	1039.12
9	Kerala	971.99	390.38	455.99
10	Madhya Pradesh	1551.13	209.93	726.96
11	Maharashtra	6579.70	1754.51	3123.52
12	Manipur	10.85	0	10.85
13	Nagaland	340	0	340
14	Odisha	491.08	300.06	191.01
15	Punjab	46.12	8.39	30.92
16	Rajasthan	773.30	136.78	636.51
17	Tamil Nadu	5266.00	2222.85	2795.01
18	Telangana	2048.96	1957.22	469.51
19	Uttar Pradesh	753.92	219.20	476.77
20	West Bengal	235.84	190.71	45.13
	TOTAL	45782.64	19626.63	18023.71

The SEZ developers are encouraged to operationalize their respective SEZs at the earliest. Any denotification of a SEZ is carried out only after the concerned State Government has given its ‘No Objection’ for the same.

This information was given by the Minister of State (Independent Charge) in the Ministry of Commerce & Industry Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman in a written reply in Rajya Sabha today.

Land allocation for SEZs prioritises waste and barren land, limits double-cropped acquisition and restricts post 2007 compulsory takings. Land allocation for SEZs is a State subject with acquisition to prioritise waste and barren land; single-crop land may be acquired if necessary and double-cropped acquisition must not exceed 10% of total SEZ land where unavoidable. The Board of Approval only considers State-recommended proposals and will not approve SEZs involving compulsory acquisition effected or proposed after 5 April 2007.