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This is an archive article published on January 8, 2015

Modi govt to revive antibiotics company, Nehru’s brainchild

Revival part of ‘Make in India’ campaign, seven months’ salary will be paid soon: Minister Ahir.

Hindustan Antibiotics, Hansraj Ahir, Pimpri Hindustan Antibiotics, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Narendra Modi, Make in India, Make in India campaign Union Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilisers Hansraj Ahir addresses the employees of Hindustan Antibiotics Ltd on Wednesday.

Ailing public sector unit Hindustan Antibiotics Ltd that has been staring at closure has a new lease of life. Union Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilisers Hansraj Ahir has assured employees of the Pimpri-based Hindustan Antibiotics — started on the initiative of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru in 1956, years after Kasturba Gandhi died of disease at a time life-saving antibiotics were not easily available in the country — would be revived as part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “Make-in-India” plan.

“In the next one or two months, HA will be up and running,” Ahir announced amid applause from HA employees who have not been paid their salary for the past seven months. Ahir, who air-dashed to Pune for an urgent meeting with company officials, workers representatives and local political representatives, said, “How long can the country bank on imports alone? We have to concentrate on exporting products made in the country. If China can do it, why can’t we? Prime Minister’s ‘Make-in-India’ and skill development plan are based on this belief.”

He added, “HA already has skilled manpower and machinery and the land to get cracking… Therefore, as part of the PM’s plans, there is no reason why we would not make all-out efforts to put HA back on its feet.” The minister said the Modi government had no intention of getting into a debate on what the previous government did and did not do. “This is a plant started on the initiative of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and we want to keep it going.”

Ahir said the seriousness of the central government in reviving HA can be gauged from the fact the management had been asked to submit a revised rehabilitation plan of over Rs 600 crore. “We received a rehabilitation plan of Rs 526 crore from HA management. We asked them to revise the plan adding Rs 100-150 crore. This is because, besides salary, dues and working capital, the company should have an additional amount to help it meet future capital requirements.”

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.   Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were  asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.     Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More

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