GIFT City: A Gift for Aircraft Lessors?

Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT City) was established in 2007 as India’s first operational smart city and an emerging global financial and IT services hub located in Gandhinagar, Gujarat. GIFT City is a personal project of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and is intended to be a centre for foreign investors to transact in Indian securities with minimal tax and bureaucracy. GIFT City allows non-Indian nationals to become corporate inhabitants and firms such as the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (the UAE’s largest sovereign wealth fund), JP Morgan Chase, MUFG and Bank of America have all set up entities in GIFT City.