The Jharkhand government is acquiring 1,000 acres of land near Ranchi for developing an IT hub with a view to make the state new 'silicon valley' of the country, a senior official said today.

The Chief Secretary of Jharkhand, Ashok Kumar Singh, told PTI that the state government has decided to make the state the new "silicon valley" of the country and for this purpose Chief Minister Arjun Munda has ordered acquisition of 1,000 acres of land near the capital.

He said that very soon the area will be acquired and it will be declared as an institutional area for the purpose of development of the IT industry.

"The bigwigs of IT industry like Wipro, IBM, HCL, Infosys and others will be invited to establish their software research and development units in the state after the development of the necessary infrastructure in the state," he added.

Asked about the problems of acquisition of such a huge land for the project, he claimed that it will be done smoothly with a pro-people policy.

He said that the state government is also formulating changes in the century old land acquisition law, to make it more pro-people and pragmatic.

Confronted with the naxal problem in the state, Singh said that these are the brief phases of the history and one should not stop its developmental efforts in view of such problems.

"Moreover the establishment of the IT industry in the state will solve the problem of unemployment in here and this will help in eradicating the naxal menace from the state," he added.