Curzon Park to get mall

The Rs 140 crore development project at Curzon Park, in the heart of Kolkata, is likely to commence from the first quarter of 2005-06.

Curzon Park, now renamed Surendranath Park, will have a shopping mall, landscaped gardens and car parking space.

The managing director of Pragati Growth and Development, R S Agarwal, said that real estate ventures from Mumbai, Kolkata and from south-east Asia have evinced keen interest in investing in the park development project.

The special purpose vehicle, which will be set up for the project, will have an equity component of around Rs 20 crore.

The Singapore government project advisory arms Surbana International, and Semb Corp, have conducted the feasibility study for the project, which is located opposite the Raj Bhavan.

Bengal Pragati, a joint venture company between the West Bengal government and Pragati group, is working as a facilitator for the project.

Agarwal said the total project cost would be around Rs 140 crore.

A major portion is likely to come from the sale of space in the shopping mall.

"The park will have 3 lakh sqare metre area for the shopping mall and shops are likely to sell well. Besides, there will be a borrowing component. Equity portion will be not more than Rs 20 crore. Lot of companies have already contacted us for the project," he added.

PSIDL is keen to get Hudco Ltd involved in the park project.

"We shall approach Hudco for the project as now we have a joint venture company," added Agarwal.

The project work was scheduled to start by June this year and should be completed within three years.

The Curzon Park project is being implemented through a collaborative platform with state governments, creating linkages with domestic and overseas expert agencies, identify institutional investors and creating management team for infrastructure projects.