A GIFT For India: Better Late Than Never?

Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT) is located in Gandhinagar and is developed by Government of Gujarat through a joint venture between its undertaking Gujarat Urban Development Company Limited and IL&FS. The project took shape in the year 2007 when the importance of international financial centres was realized because of t heir contribution (a) to the overall growth of the economy of the countries which had adopted them and (b) job creation. With the vision of then Gujarat Chief Minster, Mr. Narendra Modi to create a wo rld class finance and information technology zone, to provide services not only in India but to the entire world, the idea of setting up GIFT was conceptualized as a global financial and information technology hub, designed to be above or at par with the already exiting international financial centres in the world. After the project being languished for years, Mr. Arun Jaitley, the Finance Minister, in Union Budget 2015 announced setting up