Odisha government’s inability to make a timely intervention has forced the London-listed Vedanta Aluminium Limited (VAL) to shut down, albeit temporarily, its refinery unit at Lanjigarh in Kalahandi district.
The one-million-tonne refinery facility was shut down on Saturday due to non-availability of bauxite, the key raw material.
“Yes, it is a painful decision. We have shut down the refinery for the time being due to acute scarcity of bauxite. It is a temporary closure. If situation improves, we will reconsider the option to restart the unit,” Chief Operating Officer of VAL Mukesh Kumar said.
The closure of the refinery unit has threatened livelihood of at least six thousand people who are directly and indirectly dependent on it.
“We had earlier planned to shut down the refinery on December 5. The situation did not permit us to continue operation without raw material support," Mr Kumar said.
Stating that the company would also shut down the captive power plant, Mr Kumar said it informed the local power distribution company to supply at least 8 MW for keeping certain machinery running.
The company requires 10,000 MT of bauxite every day to operate its 1 mtpa capacity plant. As it is yet to get access to the government assured Niyamgiri bauxite reserve which was committed to it by the state government, it used to source the mineral from other states to run the unit.
However, due to shrinking of the outside bauxite sources because of new regulations, the company is facing utter scarcity of the mineral.
Odisha government which in its MoU with the aluminium major had committed to supply bauxite has expressed its inability to come to the rescue of the company immediately.