Tata quits
Your business report (August:01) highlighted the QED of Tata's on and off and on again heavy industries investment proposal. Simply stated, Tata possibly did not budge from its "no cheap gas; no investment" stand.
The responses of our business and economic heavy-weights make interesting reading; shying away from calling "a spade a spade", mostly based on generalities and skirting the realities in the proposal. Is this a reflection on their IQ on a realistic techno-economic evaluation skill of Tata's commercial proposal designed to meet Indian demands, and cleverly using our pure natural gas--ideally suited for making automobile grade steel sheet bar for the expanding automobile market in India?
I am aware of this as after my stint in the technical negotiating team and analysing Tata's attitude, I gave my personal written opinion to the then Industries Minister with copies to the officials way back in 2005. This was based on my intimate understanding of our steel product needs while working in Chittagong Steel Mills in the late1960s and again in the 1970s (two stints) covering over ten years-- including as project head for eight years, in the difficult days of the 1970s.
Tata's proposal had no provisions for billets for re-bar and small section rolling locally was not suited to our product needs. It should have been rejected then, but possibly the inculcation of the BNP gave Tata new hopes, but that too did not reach the obvious conclusion which should have been "Thank you, sorry". Our unnecessary procrastination only gave a negative image of our government's "one step forward' two steps back" way of doing things. It is in line with the old tale about the monkey climbing a greased pole!
The most interesting response came from the BOI executive chairman. He said, "If one goes, many more will come"! May his optimism come true.
However, I hope he is also aware of an old saying "A bird in hand, is worth two in the bush"! But unfortunately, the "Tata Bird", even in hand, was untamed!
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