Belagavi: The Government will recover lands allotted to more than 500 industries for not starting their ventures even after several years of sanction, Large and Medium Industries Minister Murugesh R. Nirani announced in the Assembly here on Friday.

Replying to Congress MLA N.H. Shivashankar Reddy’s query in the Assembly, Nirani said the Government has already identified the allotted lands where industries were not started even after 5 to 20 years of sanction and those will be recovered.

“Sale deed will not be done till they start the industries in full scale and they cannot use the industrial land for real estate purposes, ” he said. The Minister also said 15 percent of industrial land must be reserved for residential purposes.

Replying to MLA S. Ramappa’s query, Nirani denied the role of middlemen in the land acquisition process and said that compensation will be paid to farmers directly.

Nirani also said that the Government is committed to provide jobs to locals.