By TIOL News Service

NEW DELHI: JULY, 10, 2014: THE Union Finance Minister while presenting the General Budget 2014-15 in Parliament today, has announced that the Government is committed to revive the Special Economic Zones (SEZs) and make them more effective instruments of industrial production, economic growth, export promotion and employment generation.

The Finance Minister stated that effective steps would be undertaken to operationalize SEZs to revive investors' interest to develop better infrastructure and to effectively and efficiently use the available unutilized land.

A new line of business has been added as a "specified business" for the purposes of the investment-linked deduction under section 35AD so as to promote investment in these sectors, which are :-

(a) laying and operating a slurry pipeline for the transportation of iron ore;

(b) setting up and operating a semiconductor wafer fabrication manufacturing unit, if such unit is notified by the CBDT in accordance with the prescribed guidelines.

It is also proposed to provide that the date of commencement of operations for availing investment linked deduction in respect of the two new specified businesses shall be on or after 1st April, 2014.