India's steel consumption grew by 3.5 per cent to 62.98 million tonnes (MT) during April-January period of the current fiscal.
Steel production grew by 5.3 per cent to 75.79 MT in the same period, while imports of total finished steel gone up by 60.9 per cent to 7.4 MT.
Exports declined by 12.9 per cent to 4.3 MT.
The rise in consumption might augur well for domestic steel-makers, almost all of which are raising their capacity to
contribute to government's aim of trebling installed capacity to 300 million tonnes per annum by 2025-26.
It may be noted that consumption growth was subdued at 1.4 per cent during April-December period of the current fiscal.
The country, which is the fourth largest steel maker in the world, had consumed 60.844 MT steel in the corresponding period last year, data complied by Joint Plant Committee (JPC) showed. JPC is a body under the Steel Ministry.
Steel consumption was up by just 0.6 per cent in the entire 2013-14, its lowest in four years, at 73.93 MT compared to the previous year.
Meanwhile, on production front, major firms such as SAIL, Tata Steel, JSW and RINL together produced 38.6 MT during April-January, clocking a 3.3 per cent growth over the same period last fiscal The rest was by mini and other producers.
"India remained a net importer of total finished steel in April-January," JPC said.
