Neelachal Ispat Nigam Ltd, a steel PSU jointly promoted by trading firm MMTC and Odisha PSUs OMC and IPICOL, today announced plans to to expand its capacity to 5 million tonnes a year from 1.1 MTPA at present with an investment of Rs 5,600 crore.
"Keeping in view the present steel market scenario and also to move on a steady pace, it is decided to undertake the expansion in two phases. In the first phase NINL's capacity will be doubled to 2.2 MTPA," NINL Chairman Ved Prakash told reporters here.
In the second phase, the capacity would be raised up to 5 mtpa at the NINL plant located at Kalinga Nagar in Duburi area of Jajpur district, he said, adding that he met Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik earlier on the day and explained to him about the expansion plans.
Stating that 30 per cent of Rs 5,600 crore required for expansion work would be raised through equity and 70 per cent through debt, he said MMTC would pump in about Rs 400-Rs 500 crore for the purpose.
Prakash, who is also the CMD of MMTC, said the first phase expansion would be completed around 2020 and second phase by 2024-25.
Dismissing speculation about likelihood of other players picking up stake in NINL, he said despite global recession the company managed to survive and it is up to date on repayment of loans and interest, whereas many other steel plants are facing NPA and on the verge of closing down.
Describing the performance of NINL as satisfactory, he said it had made profits in eight years out of total 11 years of operation and now the company is a fully integrated steel plant having steel melting shop with the technology supplied by SMS-Siemag, Germany and SMS-Concast, the world leader in steel making technology.
