The Gujarat government has issued Operational Guidelines 1.0 for its Global Capability Centre (GCC) Policy 2025-30, setting out how companies get recognised as GCCs, how they apply for subsidies and when they can claim them. DeshGujarat reported the guidelines on October 3. Every application, claim and payment will now move through a single Integrated Incentive Management Portal built by the state’s Directorate of ICT and e-Governance, IANS reported, via The Hans India.
A policy that waited 20 months for its rulebook
The Department of Science and Technology notified the policy on February 11, 2025, at GIFT City. The policy document sets three targets: at least 250 new GCC units, more than 50,000 jobs and Rs 10,000 crore of investment. It also admits the starting point is narrow. Gujarat’s GCC presence sits mainly in Ahmedabad and Vadodara.
Companies could read the incentive menu from day one, but they had no published procedure for claiming it. The policy’s operative period ends on March 31, 2030. Firms must apply by then and start operations by March 31, 2031. With the guidelines arriving in October 2026, investors have about three and a half years left to apply.
What the money looks like
The policy offers two tiers. A Category I unit (fixed investment below Rs 250 crore) can get:
- Up to 20% of spending on buildings and 30% on computers, software and networking hardware, capped at Rs 50 crore and paid in 20 quarterly instalments.
- Up to 15% of yearly operating costs such as office rent, bandwidth, cloud and power, capped at Rs 20 crore a year for five years.
Mega projects, defined as Rs 250 crore or more of fixed investment or at least 500 direct jobs, get the same percentages with caps of Rs 200 crore on capital support and Rs 40 crore a year on operating support. A unit needs at least 50 employees on its payroll to qualify. If headcount stays below 50 for three straight months, the state stops further assistance.
The guidelines widen what counts as capital spending. Furniture, fixtures, renovation, civil and interior work, electrical fittings and air-conditioning systems now qualify, according to DeshGujarat. Investment made within two years of starting operations (or of applying for expansion) counts.
What it means for people looking for jobs
Several incentives tie the subsidy to hiring in Gujarat. The employment generation incentive pays the company half of one month’s salary for each new local employee kept for a year, up to Rs 50,000 for a man and Rs 60,000 for a woman. A firm can claim this only once per person, ever, so a GCC that poaches staff from another GCC gets nothing for the move. The state will also reimburse the employer’s EPF contribution for five years: 100% for women employees and 75% for men.
Those two rules give companies a reason to hire freshers and women in the state. The policy document puts Gujarat’s output at more than 32,000 IT graduates a year, a pool the state wants GCCs to hire from at home.
The clock starts at the latest date
The guidelines introduce a “Month of Eligibility”. It falls on the latest of three dates: the start of commercial operations, the government’s in-principle approval, or the month the unit reaches its eligible headcount. Operating-cost subsidies run five years from that month. The first operating-cost claim covers two quarters, with quarterly claims after that. Capital claims are due within a year of the eligible period closing. A firm that opens its office before it wins in-principle approval gets no subsidy for the months in between.
What to watch
The policy bars companies from stacking these incentives with other Gujarat government schemes, so firms will compare it against the IT/ITeS policy before applying. The useful numbers to track are the first in-principle approvals and where they land. If they cluster in GIFT City and Ahmedabad, the policy will deepen an existing hub. Approvals in Rajkot, Surat or Vadodara would show it spreading.
Sources: DeshGujarat, IANS via The Hans India, Gujarat GCC Policy 2025-30 (Department of Science and Technology)
This report was compiled and written with AI assistance from publicly reported sources, and reviewed for accuracy.