The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Commerce is keen on a probe by the Securities Exchange Board of India into the trading of shares in Dunlop India Ltd. (DIL), which has been out of operation for long.
Talking to the media after visiting the Sahagunj unit of DIL, committee Chairman Chandan Mitra said owner Pawan Kumar Ruia “seems to have no will to run the company”.
He said the panel would submit its recommendations, comprising five or six alternative proposals, before Parliament.
He declined to disclose further, saying that this would have to be discussed among panel members.
Mr. Mitra said that while Mr. Ruia chose to stay away from the panel, sending his senior management personnel, the three trade unions to which the committee members spoke appeared to be having a more credible version of matters.
The committee is on tour across the country to review the prospect of the rubber industry, but in the case of Dunlop, it felt that the vast tract of land lying unutilised at a prime location close to a highway and on the banks of the Hooghly here could be used for setting up either an IT park or food-processing industries.
To a question on whether takeover is an option, he quipped that this could be a fit case for takeover but now matters were too far gone. Machineries had aged, and workers had lost their skill. The recent Sahagunj reopening seemed to be a sham make-believe exercise, he remarked, saying that only 12 people were allowed inside the factory for ‘cleaning the equipment’.
On the SEBI probe, he said the panel would write to the capital market watchdog, asking it to enquire how there was so much of trading in DIL shares where there was neither any revenues nor any profits involved.
