Dinesh Kamath's column (Facts about Navi Mumbai and comments) that was published in Newsband

Facts about Navi Mumbai and comments

By Dinesh Kamath

Fact:

Picture of CIDCO

A government proposal to allot a plot in Navi Mumbai to the Videocon group is likely to be withdrawn. The City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO), the nodal agency of the city, is all set to send details of the stalled project to the state government. Former deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar has said the plot would not be allotted as Videocon had failed to start its project despite the passage of several years.

Comment:

Videocon is the same company to whom the state government had approved to allot 100 hectares of land in 2008 and that too for just Rs 300 crore. This had given birth to a controversy. Videocon did have a noble idea. They wanted the plot to set up a film transistor liquid crystal display plant. This would provide direct and indirect employment to 10,000 people. But that didn’t mean that state government could pass on to Videocon the plot that is worth Rs 3,500 crore for just Rs 300 crore. The then revenue minister Narayan Rane had even threatened to resign and rightly so. The plot should not be allotted to the Videocon not only because it has failed to start its project but also because city should not suffer a loss.

Fact:

Galata Chemicals announced the grand opening of its newest Technical Center in Navi Mumbai, India.

Comment:

This is indeed a great thing to happen. This will bring about technological development in Navi Mumbai. This center will come up with innovative solutions. The Technical Center offers a full range of analytical and testing capabilities in support of product and application development efforts as well as marketing and technical service for the area customers. The Technical Center is focused on providing high quality, reliable and innovative products. The company will recruit talented scientists and this will provide employment to technical brains. The opening of this Technical Center is indeed one of the best things to happen.

Fact:

Kakrapar Atomic Power Station of Nuclear Power Corporation in Tapi, Gujarat, Lanco Infratech in Korba, Chhattisgarh and Nobel Synthetics, Navi Mumbai, have bagged safety awards for 2011. The awards, instituted by the National Safety Council of India, are given to organisations in the manufacturing, construction and MSME sector.

Comment:

It is a thing of pride that Nobel Synthetics, Navi Mumbai has bagged the prestigious safety award for 2011. It received the award in the medium and small sector. NSCI, an autonomous organisation set up by the Labour Ministry in the field of occupational safety and health, has been awarding organisations since 1998. Nobel Synthetics of Navi Mumbai deserves a lot of praise for having caught the attention of Labour Ministry and was chosen for this prestigious award.

Fact:

Picture of Ganesh Naik

Thane guardian minister Ganesh Naik has directed the local administration to recruit the sons of Mathadi labourers in the work force.

Comment:

Ganesh Naik, the strongest man of Navi Mumbai, is right in wanting the sons of Mathadi labourers to be recruited. He wants the sons of those Mathadi labourers who have resigned to get jobs.

Naik, as everybody knows, belongs to Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). Now the Mathadi workers load and unload goods and work in various godowns as well as project sites. They are spread across Maharashtra and have a strong union which supports the NCP. That’s another reason why Naik has gone out of the way to support the Mathadi workers. He even went to the extent of directing CIDCO to identify land to construct homes for the labourers. He also directed officials to follow up with the railways to provide basic sanitation facilities at railyards.

Fact:

German drugs and chemicals group Merck KGaA plans to make its Indian chemicals units in Navi Mumbai a global competence centre to cater to markets in select product segments, apart from being a customer training and application development location.

Merck has currently seven such competence centres located in Germany, Japan, Taiwan, Korea, Brazil, China and the US. The Indian unit will be its eighth and will be part of the global network of Merck’s production and application training centres.

By being a global competence centre, the Navi Mumbai facility will also provide consumer training to its local and foreign clients, apart from being an international sourcing base for performance chemicals such as effect pigments and cosmetics.

Comment:

It is a thing of pride that a company of high standard like Merck has chosen Navi Mumbai to make its Indian chemicals units here a global competence centre. Both the government at the Center and State and also local government bodies should extend all the cooperation to Merck in achieving their ambition. The substantial amount of investments in terms of infrastructure, technology and people should be provided to Merck without hesitation since their intentions are absolutely noble and clean.

Also it is a globally competitive project which primarily caters to industries such as paint, packaging and printing, brand protection including anti-counterfeit solutions, and cosmetics. Merck has about 40% market share in India in this segment. There is a big local market for performance chemicals including pigments, plastics and printing material, cosmetics and others.

That is the reason why Merck looks at India, especially Navi Mumbai, as a very important market globally.

Expanding its clientele base both among the large corporations and small and medium enterprises at a faster pace is high on the company’s agenda. Setting up a global network centre here to provide both product-related services as well as application and development consultancy will help achieving this goal faster.

Thus it is obvious that India and Merck and most importantly, Navi Mumbai, will stand to benefit if the plan materializes.