Mumbai, Oct 4 (IANS) The Maharashtra Cabinet led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on Friday cleared the revised policy for mega projects based on advanced technology in a bid to promote more such projects in the state.

According to the revised policy, the state government will provide an industrial promotion subsidy, to the mega projects based on advanced technology with an investment of Rs 10,000 crore anywhere in the state regardless of sector-wise classification.

These projects will be given an industrial incentive subsidy which is 100 percent of the fixed capital investment.

For the mega project with an investment of Rs 20,000 crore, the state government will provide a subsidy of 11 per cent of that investment in the prevailing collective incentive scheme.

According to the Chief Minister's Office (CMO), so far a total of 5 projects have been approved and two projects are before the Cabinet Sub-Committee for its consideration. Three more projects are yet to be approved. Through these seven projects, an investment of Rs 1.79 lakh crore will be made in the state and nearly 60,000 jobs will be created.

The government expects an investment of more than Rs 2 lakh crore with three more such projects. The proposed investment will be in total 10 projects. More than 1 lakh jobs will be created with the development of these projects.

The Maharashtra Cabinet approved a few amendments and new provisions in this scheme to make it possible to take decisions promptly, and the Cabinet Sub-Committee under the chairmanship of the Chief Minister has been authorised to take those decisions.

Apart from this, the government will provide capital grants to industries in the aerospace and defense sector. It has proposed a limit of two projects in five manufacturing sectors and a maximum of three projects in each sector with total projects remaining 10 for getting incentives.

These projects will be promoted in Palghar district, Vidarbha, Marathwada, Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg, Dhule and Nandurbar areas. In the case of more than ten proposals in the thrust sector, special incentives will be given as per Collective Incentive Scheme without capital subsidy.

Meanwhile, the state Cabinet also cleared the build, use and transfer (BOT) policy for the development of small hydro power projects and co-located solar power plants through private sector involvement.

Earlier, 42 small hydro power plants with generation capacity of 163.65 MW have been already developed. However, the Cabinet decided to revise the existing policy.

Accordingly, the promoters will be selected for the development of 37 small hydro power projects with 101.39 MW generation capacity through a transparent bidding process. The Cabinet has fixed a threshold premium of Rs 50 lakh per megawatt for such projects.