ArcelorMittal, the world’s largest steel producer, on Monday said that it would downsize its workforce in India.
This follows the company’s decision to pull out of its $12-billion venture in Odisha.
“As we have made slower than anticipated progress with our India projects, the requirements for the number of people on the ground have reduced,” the company said in a statement.
Other projects
The steel maker could exit two more projects in India because the progress has not been satisfactory.
The projects in Karnataka and Jharkhand involved investments of $18 billion.
Chairman Lakshmi Mittal, while commenting on the April-June quarter results, said ArcelorMittal may think of exiting these two projects if no substantial progress is made soon. “There is a progress in these States (Karnataka and Jharkhand), but at the same time, we would like to make it clear that these progresses are still not very satisfactory, we will have to continue to watch and see what is the progress.”
The company, however, said that the downsizing does not impact its ability to continue to work on the two remaining projects in Jharkhand and Karnataka.
“Under the leadership of Vijay Bhatnagar, CEO of ArcelorMittal India and China, we are confident we have the right team required for the projects at this point in time,” it said.
Sanak Mishra resigns
A report from PTI had said that Sanak Mishra, Vice-President, ArcelorMittal and CEO for Greenfield Projects in India had quit.
He was spearheading the Odisha project and had joined the company in 2006 in its erstwhile avatar of Mittal Steel, after spending 30 years with state-owned SAIL.