I am happy to be with you again on the occasion of the presentation of this trophy for the best integrated steel plant for 1999-2000. I congratulate Tata Iron & Steel Company for winning this trophy. Perhaps, we all should say “Three Cheers to TISCO”, because it has won this trophy for the third time.

I heartily commend the workers and management of TISCO for this achievement.

Tata Steel and Jamshedpur have an honored place in the history of India’s industrialization. Jamshedji Tata was one of the pioneers of Swadeshi industry during the British rule. Not many people of today’s generation know that Jamshedji Tata drew inspiration from Swami Vivekananda in developing and implementing his vision for native industrialization.

The two were co-passengers on a voyage to America in 1893, when Swamiji was on his way to deliver his historic address at the World Parliament of Religions. On the way, they together visited several places in Japan. It was Swamiji who urged Tata to go in for indigenous industrial production. Similarly, Tata wrote to Swamiji requesting his blessings for his scheme to start a top-class Research Institute of Science in India. Swamiji actively campaigned for its establishment, among other things by sending Sister Nivedita and three other disciples to England to meet British authorities. This is how the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore came up.

Thus, Tata Steel was, in some ways, forged in the fire of India’s Freedom Struggle. Today India is waging a struggle of a different kind — the struggle to succeed in international competition, the struggle to build a steely edifice for our economy, so that our economy becomes so strong that it can fully meet the needs of our national security and all-round development.

This struggle also will need the same spirit of nationalism that energized our forefathers a century ago. Today this spirit of nationalism has to manifest itself in the creation of better products, better technology, better management practices, and a better all-round image of India globally.

I understand that there is a healthy competition among steel plants to become eligible for this trophy. Such competition to achieve excellence and efficiency is the need of the hour for the Indian steel sector — indeed, for every sector of Indian industry.

This is all the more important since India’s steel industry is today completely liberalized. We have thrown it open to global competition. The international market now influences steel prices in our country.

Such international competition presents both a challenge and an opportunity to our steel industry. If our steel plants are able to match or — better still — surpass competition in terms of cost and quality, there is an opportunity to take Indian steel to world markets.

I am told that TISCO has successfully restructured itself to be among the best steel plants in the world in certain parameters. This is perhaps the secret of its winning the trophy so often.

All of us know that the steel industry in India has been passing through difficult times for the last three to four years. This is true not only in India but globally as well. There is excess capacity worldwide. This has depressed international prices for several items of finished steel.

Unfortunately, this has also resulted in some developed countries taking unfair measures to restrict steel imports from India.

What’s happening is truly ironical. Developed countries advocate free trade and aggressively try to gain access to markets in developing countries. Nevertheless, the very same countries erect unjustified barriers to products from developing nations. This violates the spirit of a just and non-discriminatory world trade regime. One of the reasons for the current troubles of the Indian steel industry is these unfair trade barriers.

When I visited the United States last year, we raised this issue with our American friends. Our Commerce Minister raised this matter also in Doha. I hope that barriers to our steel exports will be discarded soon.

Friends,

Today’s difficulties should not blind us to the bright prospects for our steel industry tomorrow. India is a country of over one billion people. Our per capita consumption of steel is only about 26 kilos. This is very less compared to the global average of 121 kilos. The demand for steel is bound to increase as we continue to develop our infrastructure, industry, and agriculture.

For example, all of you know that the Government has launched the ambitious National Highway Development Project. It aims to connect the four corners of our country with 13,000 kilometers of world-class highways. We are going to spend more than Rs. 50,000 crore on this project. Work on many stretches of the Golden Quadrilateral, linking the four metro cities, has already begun.

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways tells me that the project will consume one million tonnes of steel in its first phase alone.

We want to similarly boost steel consumption in Indian railways, in housing construction, and in our various port and airport projects. There is much scope for increasing the demand for steel in our other ambitious project — the national Gram Sadak Yojana. We also need many small and medium bridges in rural areas, not to speak about big bridges across our rivers. In recent years, there has been a flurry of construction of flyovers in our cities.

We want to accelerate all these activities, because they will cumulatively step up our economy’s growth. We want to double our per capita national income in ten years. This will mean raising the GDP growth rate to 8 percent and above from the present 5.5 percent. This will create employment opportunities on a large-scale — which is our first developmental priority. It will also create a huge demand for a whole host of industrial products, including steel.

Our economic reforms are geared to achieve this overriding objective. Which is why, I have been appealing to all sections of our society to support our agenda of economic reforms. It is not true that economic reforms will benefit only those who are already rich. We do not want such reforms. If there is any possibility that such a thing might happen, we will not hesitate to reform those undesirable aspects of reforms.

This goal can be achieved only if every section of our society, especially industry contributes its fullest. I am hopeful that the organized working class and its various trade unions will also come forward to ensure the success of economic reforms.

Our industry, both organized and unorganized, has to quickly modernize itself. I would especially like our steel industry to make all-out efforts to improve its profitability.

Wherever costs can be reduced, they should be reduced.

Wherever efficiencies can be gained, they should be gained.

And where restructuring is a must, we should not hesitate to go for it.

The government has already demonstrated its commitment to help the steel industry come out of its current difficulties. This help has cost the country a lot of money. But such help can only be transitional; it cannot be permanent. I am sure that every one in the steel industry realizes this hard fact.

TISCO has set an example in profitability, overcoming many odds that the industry has been currently facing. SAIL also has unveiled an ambitious modernization programme and I am told that its efforts are yielding desirable results. Its losses have come down. I hope that they will come down further and soon make way for profits. I have full faith in our PSUs that they will confront the odds and rise to the occasion.

I can hardly overstate the importance of Research and Development as a critical contributor to the success of the ongoing modernization efforts. The Government is already providing financial assistance for R&D in the steel sector. I am confident that the private sector and the public sector will step up their R & D activities and, in doing so, learn from each other’s experiences.

In the end, I would thank the Ministry of Steel and the Indian steel sector for their continuous efforts to contribute to India’s industrial development. I wish you all success.

Thank you.