Under the present policy, Indian companies undertaking construction and maintenance of roads, highways, vehicular bridges, toll roads, vehicular tunnels, ports and harbours are eligible for automatic approval upto 74% foreign equity.

2. The Government have reviewed the existing guidelines for automatic approval for foreign equity for construction and maintenance of roads, highways, vehicular bridges, toll roads, vehicular tunnels, ports and harbours and has decided to enlarge the provisions for automatic approval for such projects. Accordingly, projects for "construction and maintenance of roads, highways, vehicular bridges, toll roads, vehicular tunnels, ports and harbours" will be permitted foreign equity participation upto 100% on the automatic approval route, provided the total foreign equity in any such project does not exceed Rs.1500 crore.

3. The provisions referred to in Para 2 above would be listed as a fresh entry D-2 under the heading Part "D" of Annexure III as appended to this Press Note. The existing entry No.C-6 in Part "C" of Annexure III shall stand modified to this extent and read as under:

"Construction and maintenance of rail beds, non-vehicular bridges, non-vehicular tunnels, ropeways and runways."

4. The list appended to this Press Note is based on the National Industrial classification of all economic activities (NIC), 1987. The entrepreneurs / investors are advised to give the description of the activities under this classification system when submitting the application to the RBI.

5. All other terms and conditions as notified under Press Note No.2(1997 series) dated the 17^th January, 1997 and Press Note No.14 (1997 series) dated 8^th October, 1997 remain unchanged.

Sd/-

(Ashok Kumar)

Joint Secretary to the Government of India.

New Delhi, the 4th January,1999