Government to give push for IFC at BKC

Moots ‘hub and spoke model’ in which Centre will aid business infra

In a bid to give a push for the International Financial Centre (IFC) plan at Bandra-Kurla Complex (BKC), the state government is said to have mooted a ‘hub and spoke model’ under which the Centre will assist the state government to attract investors by building the required infrastructure of business incubation centres, tinkering labs and research centres.

The proposal for the same is to be presented in the IFC committee meeting under the aegis of Union minister of state for finance Jayant Sinha on Monday.

“We think that the ‘hub and spoke model’ is a sustainable model and also the Prime Minister has apprised the said model recently for the ‘Start up India initiative’. The state government has demarcated 50 acres of land for the ‘hub and spoke model’ and it plans to give floor space index (FSI) of five for the same. The plan is to have bigger financial activities from the back and front end,” said a bureaucrat who is a committee member of the IFC.

In May 2015, chief minister Devendra Fadnavis had revived the proposal for the IFC, which has only been on paper for close to six years now. Mr Fadnavis had set up a committee for planning and preparation of legal framework and it consisted of state’s chief secretary Swadheen Kshatriya, principal secretary of urban development department, Nitin Kareer and the Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development (MMRDA) commissioner UPS Madan.

“The ‘hub and spoke model’ for IFC will be like where there will be multiple locations sourcing, with a central location called the ‘hub’. Hub will act as a single point of contact to the client and the ‘spoke’ will be spread around different locations of the IFC. In simple words, a hub will act as a manufacturer and the spoke will have to be used as delivery centre which will deal more with the clients directly,” the bureaucrat, who did not wish to be named, said.

The ‘hub and spoke model’ is mainly used by aviation and manufacturing sectors. The best Indian example of the model is the Agricultural produce market committee (APMC) where the APMC acts as the ‘hub’ and wholesale and retail markets act as a ‘spoke’ which directly deals with the clients.

“We anticipate international insurance companies to come in for setting up their set ups at IFC. In the first phase of the project, the state government will also propose plans for better education facilities in BKC followed by health and residential facilities to balance growth,” the bureaucrat added.