I was reading with interest today's news story on Hindustan Motors shutting down operations at its Uttarpara, West Bengal plant. That another plant in the Communists ruled state of West Bengal is facing labour unrest is nothing to be surprised of, but, what really bewildered me were the statistics at the HM Plant. Have a look - 4,500 workers belonging to five labour unions turn out a little more than a 1,000 Ambassador cars every month. That should send all management and productivity gurus running to consult HM on lean manufacturing.

In all fairness, the same lot of workers also make a handful of RTVs, Trekker and Pushpaks (rural utility vehicles) and maybe a few hundred engines and some other components as well but hey, look at it any way, 4500 is a huge lot.

And with five labour unions - CITU, SSU, SSKU, AITUC and one other acronym - running the plant as their own kingdom, there's very little that can be done.

HM's Uttarpara plant is looked at with interest by analysts not for the quality of cars (a big question mark there) coming out, but for the huge tract of land that the company has under its control. That is a million car plant, not a ten thousand a year one. In recent times, the HM stock has stayed afloat only thanks to the huge tract of land that the company controls in a city like Kolkata where demand for new housing is expected to firm up. At analyst meetings, the only thing that the wise guys listen to with interest is whether the Kolkata based company has finalised any plans to construct luxury condominiums at its spare chunk of land.

Not a great compliment for a carmaker that was once the country's biggest!

Deepesh Rathore
Research Editor
deepesh.rathore@supplierbusiness.com

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