Post curbs, Ambala’s scientific goods industry on revival path

Tribune News Service

Ambala, October 3

Lifting the restrictions imposed since March and diversification of business have brought a ray of hope for the revival of Ambala’s famous scientific instruments industry, which was hit hard by the Covid lockdown.

Besides, the rising clamour to boycott ‘Made in China’ goods had also served a heavy blow to the local industry, which was mostly dependent on Chinese items.

The lifting of movement restrictions, permission to open the shops daily and conducting of competitive and university exams have revived almost one-third of some 2,500 big and small enterprises, recording an annual turnover of around Rs 2,000 crore before being hit by the Covid pandemic.

Besides, diversification is the new normal for the scientific instruments industry. With educational institutions still lying shut, the demand of scientific instruments was yet to pick up.

PPE kits, thermal scanners, face shields, face masks, fogging machines, sanitiser kits, dispensers, sodium hypochlorite solution used for sanitisation purposes, infra-red chambers, ultra-violet chambers, fume hoods and even gloves are some of the many items that the local scientific industrialists had started supplying in retail and wholesale market.

With the competition getting stiff in the diversified field, local traders have started offering lucrative offers and heavy discounts on the bulk sale of such items.

After remaining completely shut for almost three months, a majority of the micro, small and medium enterprises, including those dealing in scientific instruments, have resumed their operations in Ambala district for the past over two months. Over 15,000 migrant labourers, who were earlier working with these units and putting up in nearby areas, had also returned to work at the reopened units.

Another dealer Satish Kumar said initially, the sales were good but with each passing day, the numbers were coming down.

“We have started dealing in Covid preventive and safety items but the margin of profit is not much,” said another trader Vinay Jain.

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