Pune: Due to the shortage of land for industries across the State, Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) has begun surveying unutilised land given out to industries to reclaim it. The activity commenced at old industrial estates across the State, including in Pimpri-Chinchwad, about two to three months ago. According to sources from MIDC, obtaining land for industry has become excessively difficult in the last few months. Initially, there was resistance from farmers or land owners only in Hinjewadi, but now resistance is on the rise at other places too. Due to this, MIDC has had to denotify land in various developing industrial estates around Pune. 1,866 hectares of land was notified and denotified at Khed Phase III in June 2016 due to resistance from farmers. Likewise, 956 hectares of land is in the process of denotification at Jejuri. Some land at Karla too has been denotified due to similar reasons, sources said. The shortage of land has led MIDC authorities to begin surveys of allotted unutilised chunks of land across all old industrial estates. Companies holding large chunks of unutilised land will have to surrender the land to MIDC. “If a company had been allotted 400 acres of land but only about 250 acres has been utilised, MIDC will re-claim about 100 acres and put it to industrial or commercial use,” the sources said. The sources added that only the land that has been lying unused for the last 15 years or more will be reclaimed by MIDC. “In case of new industrial estates, companies are still in the process of development and may require the land for expansion. We are thus targeting only those estates that have been set up and running for the last 35 years or more,” the sources said. According to the sources in MIDC, the move will not only solve the problem of land shortage but also increase revenue for MIDC.