Gujarat has launched its first Data Centre Policy, 2026–29 to position the state as a hub for hyperscale data centres, cloud services and AI-enabled digital infrastructure. The policy aims for ₹6 lakh crore in investments and 7.5 gigawatts (GW) of data centre capacity during the policy period.

The announcement matters for UPSC because data centres are now part of industrial policy, digital governance, power planning and water management. Their growth is linked to cloud computing, digital payments, e-commerce, electronics manufacturing and artificial intelligence (AI), all of which are core themes in the modern economy syllabus.

What happened

The policy was launched in Gandhinagar by Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel. The state government said the policy is designed to attract large-scale capital, generate employment and strengthen Gujarat’s role in India’s digital economy.

Officials also said Gujarat wants to compete more strongly with established data-centre destinations such as Telangana, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.

Key incentives in the policy

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