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PSUs in for a turnaround: Achuthanandan

Staff Reporter

Government to foster cooperation among the units

KOCHI: Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan has called upon employees and managements of public sector units to work together and prove wrong critics who spread the notion that all Government-owned industrial establishments are white elephants.

The Chief Minister was speaking after inaugurating the fourth stage expansion of a membrane-cell caustic-soda plant of Travancore Cochin Chemicals (TCC) at Udyogamandal, near here, on Monday.

He said the Left Democratic Front Government was correcting the mistakes of the previous United Democratic Front regime, which turned Kerala into a graveyard of industrial units.

The Government was committed to fulfilling the promise of turning public sector undertakings around, and several steps had been taken in this direction. The Thiruvannoor cotton spinning mill in Kozhikode, closed for more than three years, was reopened on Sunday, he added.

Wrong policies

The previous Government followed wrong policies, driving public sector undertakings into losses. The Global Investor Meet (GIM) organised by it had failed to achieve any result, he said.

His Government had helped to correct the image that the Left Democratic Front was anti-development. Revival of the TCC, steps to set up an integrated textile plant in Palakkad, inauguration of the CMML titanium sponge plant and plan for a Balaramapuram spinning mill were examples of the Government's commitment to industrial revival.

Minister for Industries Elamaram Karim, who delivered the presidential address, said the Government was ready to back the fifth stage expansion of the membrane-cell plant, and asked its managing director to submit a report in this regard.

He said if the current performance of the TCC and market conditions continued, the company would be able to wipe out its financial obligations in the near future.

Wealth of people

Mr. Karim called upon the management and labourers to cooperate and lead the company to a new future. Public sector units were the wealth of people, and the Government was duty bound to protect them. It had set aside Rs. 59 crore in the budget for their revival. A list of units to be revived was being compiled, and the Government had decided to foster cooperation among them. He urged the companies to achieve full capacity utilisation, cut expenses and increase productivity.

Under the cooperation plan, electrical meters produced by the United Electrical Company would be bought by the Kerala State Electricity Board. Monthly production of meters by the company had now gone up from 17,000 to 85,000 pieces, and it would soon touch one lakh.

A Rs. 22-crore revival plan for the textile corporation and a new venture at Autokast with the Railways were on the anvil, the Minister said.

M.P. Sukumaran Nair, Managing Director of TCC, welcomed the gathering and presented a report on the company.

Minister for Fisheries S. Sarma launched Eco-Clean, a cleaning agent from the company.

A.M. Yousef, K. Babu, Saju Paul and Luidy Luiz, MLAs, and E. Balanandan, trade union leader, were present.

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