Infosys is all set to enter West Bengal. The company said it has been allotted 50 acres of land by the government to set up an IT campus at Rajarhat.

After Tata Motors' retreat from the state, this project is seen as leading to the revival of Bengal's dwindling industrial fortune.

Infosys will invest 1 billion rupees initially in the project, which is tipped to be the company’s east India hub for IT and ITeS operations.

“Infosys has been allocated 50 acres of land in Rajarhat by the West Bengal state government. The state government has assured us of their support in this project,” the company said in a statement.

Earlier, Infosys was supposed to have land in the planned mega IT Township adjacent to Vedic Village in Rajarhat.

The Vedic fiasco and the shelving of the mega IT township project had subsequently put all IT/ITeS related plans of the state government completely out of

Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee said the decision of Infosys to invest in West Bengal is a major boost for the IT industry in the state. The government is all set to assure all support to this project, he said.

“Mr Gopalakrishnan said that Infosys was ready to start off its expansion plans in West Bengal and therefore operations would start soon. He also said that the project will create some 15,000-20,000 jobs and the first phase will be ready within a year,” Debesh Das, IT minister, told the Economic Times.

The Marxist government thinks, this time it would be difficult for Mamta Banerjee, the Trinumool leader who had recently run an anti-land acquisition campaign at Rajarhat, to destroy this project.

On the other hand, the opposition party has already claimed that it was Mamta Banerjee’s pressure which finally forced the Marxist Government to wake up and do some good for the state’s IT revolution. The opposition also claimed that it never stood against the Rajarhat project.

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