Sonepat industry suffers Rs 35,000 cr loss in a year

Mukesh Tandon

Tribune News Service

Sonepat, November 21

The medium, small and large industries in the Kundli, Rai, Nathupur, Liwaspur areas of the district have suffered a loss of over Rs 35,000 crore in the past one year due to the blockade at the Singhu border, an epicentre of the farmers’ movement. After Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement that the three farm laws will be repealed, industrialists are hopeful that their situation will improve.

Paid for bad roads

• Kundli Industrial Assn chief Subhash Gupta said industrialists were forced to bear the cost of damage to roads and streetlights.
• The traffic of NH-44 has been shifted to the Kundli industrial area roads due to the blockade. Excess traffic load has damaged the roads badly.

As many as 20 per cent industries have been shut down, scores of others shifted from Kundli, and hundreds of labourers moved out in the course of the year-long movement.

Thousands of farmers from Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have been camping at Delhi borders since November 26 last year.

The farmers’ protest spread over 8 km from Kundli to the main roundabout of the Kundli-Manesar-Palwal (KMP) and the Kundli-Ghaziabad-Palwal (KGP) expressways.

Subhash Gupta, president of the Kundli Industrial Association, said the Kundli industrial zone was the worst affected due to the farmers’ movement.

Of the 1,800 industries in the Kundli industrial area, 20 per cent were shut down and the remaining, which were running from rented accommodations, have been shifted.

Gupta claimed farmers had blocked all four entry points to the industrial zone.

Dheeraj Chaudhary, an industrialist, said Sonepat was a hub of micro, small

and medium enterprises (MSMEs), but the production had reduced over 30 per cent, which was a big setback.

Rakesh Devgun, chairman, Haryana Chamber of Commerce and Industries, Sonepat chapter, and president of the Rai Industries Estate Manufacturers Association, said Sonepat was a hub of MSME units. “It is a hub of stainless steel and auto parts exports and Rai is the biggest focal point for packaging and printing in the northern zone,” he said. As many as 13,000 registered and 7,000 unregistered units are there in Kundli, Nathupur, Rai, Barhi, Dhaturi, Ram Nagar, Liwaspur and Bahalgarh of Sonepat district, he said.

Buyers have cancelled export orders as they are unable to reach industries due to road blockades. Besides, the cost of production has increased, with the cost of raw materials, transportation and logistics charges having gone up because of the blockades. Around 30 per cent of labourers have now migrated to Noida, Ghaziabad and other industrial areas, Devgun added.

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