More and more jobs my job: Chandrababu Naidu

Tirupati: Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has stressed once again his government’s commitment to create more employment avenues through industrial development. He unveiled a plaque on the occasion of groundbreaking ceremony for Hero Motocorp Chittoor Plant at Madanapalem near Sri City in Satyavedu mandal of Chittoor district on Friday.

Naidu termed the occasion historic as the Hero Motocorp has entered South India by laying their footprint first in Andhra Pradesh. He wished that the company should focus on producing electric vehicles at the earliest and capture that market, which has huge potential.

Hero Motocorp chairman and CEO Pawan Munjal positively reacted to this saying that they will definitely be getting into the sector of electric vehicles. “In fact, four years ago, we have displayed a hybrid scooter at an auto expo and invested in a start-up in Bengaluru.

We will soon be launching the product,” he said. Munjal said they were also developing both motorcycles and scooters at their own R&D unit in Jaipur and these two products will also be launched soon. Naidu praised the Hero Motocorp for being the largest manufacturers of two-wheelers for the last 17 years.

They have been No 1 two-wheeler company in the country and in the world in terms of unit value of sales in a calendar year. With eight lakh employees and a turnover of Rs 31,000 crore in the fiscal 2016-17, besides a market cap of Rs 69,000 crore, the company’s fundamentals were very strong.

Already they have reached all corners of the country and various parts of the world and with their 8th plant they can expand further, he said. Logistics wise, the area is at a strategic location well connected with air, sea, rail and road to several other parts of the country. The nearby Krishnapatnam port will give the industries in this region the much-needed impetus, Naidu said.

The area will have no problems relating to power, water or any other resources. With all the infrastructure, it will become very promising unit, Naidu pointed out. “I am confident that latest version bikes will come from here to go to international market. I hope and look for the first phase works of the company be completed early and by March 2019 the first vehicle should come out,” Naidu maintained.

For this, he assured all help from the government and stressed that personally he was just a call away to Pawan Munjal. “Huge investments were coming to this area after bifurcation and it will develop as an automobile hub. Two industrial corridors going through the state connecting Krishnapatnam, making it a strategic port and in future, this area will become best industrial zone in the country,” Naidu underlined.

In his address, Pawan Munjal said that the eco-friendly green manufacturing plant here, when it becomes fully operational, will take up their total combined installed capacity to 11 million units of motorcycles and scooters per annum. It will generate 12,000 new jobs directly and indirectly accelerating the socio-economic progress in the state. They have already five world-class plants in India and one each in Colombia and Bangladesh.

This eighth facility will spread over 600 acres and will have an installed capacity of 1.8 million units and will achieve that in three phases, he said. The company will invest Rs 1,600 crore to set up this facility. He said they were committed to maintaining ecological standards. Munjal also stressed their strategic initiative of building world-class infrastructure in order to meet future market demand and consolidate the leadership.