In bid to scale up business at Surat Diamond Bourse, ‘over 100’ traders, brokers open new offices

Sources said the business activities at SDB had slowly started to pick up as a large number of diamond traders and brokers started visiting it daily.

According to sources in the SDB big firms like Dhanera Diamonds, P Hitesh, Anju Gems, and a few others, have completely shut down their offices in the trading hub of Mahidharpura, Surat and opened new offices at SDB. This has caused medium-sized traders, who have offices in Mahidharpura, to open offices at the SDB as well.

SDB vice chairman Lalji Patel said, “The diamond brokers on Tuesday formed the Surat Diamond Brokers Association at SDB and also made a WhatsApp group where different information related to the diamond industry and SDB will be provided. More people will be added to the group, and it will be expanded further, making the business activities stronger.”

Rajya Sabha MP and SDB Chairman Govind Dholakia also paid a visit to the SDB and met those who had recently opened their offices and congratulated them.

Known as the DREAM (Diamond Research and Mercantile) City located in Khajod on Surat’s outskirts, the SDB  has nine interconnected towers, with over 4,500 offices, and a customs clearance house. Spread over  67 lakh square feet of floor area, it was built with the aim of converting Surat, a manufacturing hub of gems, into a global diamond trading hub.

Traders with whom The Indian Express had spoken to last month had listed one of the major problems being the distance – 18 km – from the diamond trading hubs of Mahidharpura, Varachha and Katargam which made the transporting of diamonds to Khajod, “risky”

Sources in the diamond industry said that the Mumbai diamond traders who had owned offices at SDB are showing less interest in starting their expanded business there. A diamond merchant who has offices in Surat and Mumbai said that traders would come and start businesses in Surat only once the SDB would become fully operational.