Before construction / GSIR Act sections 8, 15 and 16
What it costs to get permission to build
Nobody may build inside the region without the development authority's permission, and nobody may occupy the finished building without a second approval. A scrutiny fee is required for both. The amount is not printed anywhere.
The application for development permission is Form C, filed on paper with the Chief Executive Officer of the authority. The Building Use checklist has a line for the fee paid and leaves the figure blank, which is as close as this record comes to catching a charge in the act of not being published. The three month deemed grant and the one year validity are set out below.
Scrutiny fee amount blankThree month deemed grantPermission valid one yearLast verified: 4 August 2026
01You cannot build without asking
No person or entity may erect or occupy any building or structure within the Special Investment Region except with the previous permission of the Regional Development Authority. Form C is that application.
The application is Form C, addressed to the Chief Executive Officer of the development authority, and it goes in on paper rather than through a portal. It is assessed against a published scrutiny checklist.
When the building is finished there is a second approval, called Building Use or occupancy permission. Every person, unit or developer in the SIR must obtain DSIRDA approval after completion and before use of the premises. Without BU the building cannot lawfully be occupied.
02The fee that has a line but no number
Three approvals stand between owning a plot inside the region and lawfully using a building on it. Two of them require a fee and neither prints the amount.
| Step | Record | Published fee | Under which law |
|---|---|---|---|
| Route a new unit or economic activity through the Apex Authority single point of contact | SIR-DEV-03 | no official fee published | Section 18, Gujarat Special Investment Region Act, 2009 |
| Apply to DSIRDA for development permission (Form C) | SIR-DEV-01 | no official fee published | Sections 8, 15 and 16, Gujarat Special Investment Region Act, 2009 |
| Obtain Building Use (BU) / occupancy permission from DSIRDA | SIR-DEV-02 | A scrutiny fee is required - the checklist has a line for the fee amount deposited with a receipt number and date - but THE AMOUNT IS BLANK on the... | Section 15(4)(b), Gujarat Special Investment Region Act, 2009 |
The Building Use checklist has a line on it for the scrutiny fee deposited, with space for a receipt number and a date. The amount itself is blank on the published form. That is a fee which plainly exists and which the authority plainly collects, with no published figure attached to it.
No development permission fee is published on the Form C page or in the form itself. The Building Use scrutiny checklist requires a fee and leaves the amount blank. The development control regulations, which may carry a fee schedule, were not among the documents available. Recorded as no official fee published rather than estimated.
03The three month rule again, and the one year limit
Under section 29 of the Gujarat Town Planning and Urban Development Act, 1976, which applies mutatis mutandis in the SIR: if the appropriate authority fails to communicate its order to the applicant within THREE MONTHS from the date of receipt of the application, the permission shall be DEEMED TO HAVE BEEN GRANTED on the expiry of that period. Section 32: every permission granted or deemed granted under section 29 remains in force for ONE YEAR and then lapses; the authority may extend it by periods not exceeding on
So the same deemed grant that applies to farmland conversion applies here: silence for three months counts as permission. The catch on the other side is that a permission, once granted or deemed granted, is valid for one year and cannot be extended beyond an aggregate of three years. A permission obtained early and sat on expires.
Record SIR-DEV-01. Source: doc_172.pdf page 1 (form title and addressee); doc_173.pdf pages 1-19 (checklist); GSIR Act 2009 pages 17-18 (s.16(2) previous permission required, s.16(5)(a) fifteen-day appeal, s.17(3) DSIRDA is the Appropriate Authority under GTPUDA); gtpuda.pdf page 26 (s.29 three-month deemed grant) and page 27 (s.32 one-year validity, three-year aggregate cap). Statutory basis: Sections 8, 15 and 16, Gujarat Special Investment Region Act, 2009; sections 27, 29, 32, 34 and 49, Gujarat Town Planning and Urban Development Act, 1976 (applied by section 17 of the GSIR Act, under which DSIRDA is the 'Appropriate Authority' for the SIR area). Data class OFFICIAL. Last verified: 4 August 2026.
The words on this page, in plain English
- DSIRDA
- Dholera Special Investment Region Development Authority, the body that grants development and building permission inside the region.
- Special Investment Region, SIR
- An area notified under the Gujarat Special Investment Region Act 2009 and governed by a development authority rather than by the ordinary local body.
- Non-agricultural land, NA land
- Farmland that has been legally converted to building use by an order under section 65 of the Gujarat Land Revenue Code. Until that order exists the land is still farmland in law, whatever is standing on it.
- Final plot
- The serviced plot an owner is left holding once a town planning scheme has redrawn the area. It is smaller than the original field but it has road access and services.
- Town planning scheme, TP scheme
- The process that takes the existing farm plots of an area, lays roads and services across them, and hands each owner back a smaller serviced plot.