Business

Shutter Down At Barnala Cotton Mill leaves 350 unemployed

The biggest flagship spinning industry unit in Punjab - The Malwa Cotton Spinning Mills Limited has recently shut down its fully functional unit at Barnala, leaving more than 350 workers and employees out of job. The other unit of the company at Paonta Sahib in Himachal Pradesh had closed down a few months ago and now only one unit at Machhiwara near Ludhiana is functional. Nearly two decades ago, Malwa was the most sought after region for industries in Punjab. However, a recent assessment by Punjab industries minister Madan Mohan Mittal had revealed that around 200 industrial units have closed in the state in the past few years.

The Barnala unit of the Malwa Cotton Spinning Mills was established in 1981. In 1996, an export-oriented unit was added to it. The total installed capacity of the unit was 74,000 spindles. The mill was performing extraordinarily till 2000 with nearly 1,700 workers and employees. The mill was producing 40-45 tonne yarn every day from fibre earning and marked an annual turnover of over Rs 450 crore. But Manufacturing came down to nearly 6 tonne per day in December 2012 and the work force was reduced to nearly 350 as the mill began incurring heavy losses. On August 31, when the company management finally pulled down the shutters, 350-odd workers demanded protested in demand of their dues.

Punjab cotton factories and ginners association president Bhagwan Dass Bansal mentioned, "Due to unfavourable policies of the state and the Union government, the cotton and spinning mills have been on the decline for nearly a decade in Punjab. Number of cotton mills have reduced to 108 from 422 within almost a decade." While Malwa Cotton Spinning Mills vice-president Anil Jain, assured: "The company ran into losses and was declared sick. The case has been referred to BIFR. The company guarantees to pay the dues to all the employees by September 25."