As per a media report stating that an unnamed senior Gujarat state official has said that Maruti Suzuki India is planning to double its planned production capacity at Gujarat plant which is expected to go operational in 2015-16. As per this report, the planned capacity for the initial phase will be around 5 lakh cars per year which is twice of what was initially planned. However, from some previous reports on Maruti’s Gujarat plant, it was mentioned that there will be an initial capacity of close to 10 lakh cars, which is in fact twice of what has been shared in the fresh report. There seems to be some inconsistency and confusion over the numbers (production capacity), but the news that Maruti maybe planning to double its capacity in Gujarat maybe true. There has been no official statement related to this from MSIL so far and they have neither confirmed nor denied this report.
Considering the recent events of Maruti Suzuki Manesar plant which claimed the life of a manager, it is quite possible that Maruti Suzuki might be looking forward to develop higher capacities away from Haryana. So far, it seems Maruti Suzuki has put all its eggs in same basket by keeping all its major operations in Haryana. In any case of a trouble or natural disruption, the whole operations of Maruti Suzuki may get threatened, however, by developing higher capacity in Gujarat, it will help Maruti to expand its reach, get closer to export ports and also reduce the transportation cost of delivering cars to the southern parts of India.
Maruti Suzuki will be spending close to Rs. 12000 crore for developing its plant as well as developing vendors and supply chain for components of its cars near its plant. Gradually, Maruti Suzuki will increase the production capacity in the coming phases. The location of the Gujarat plant is in Mehsana which is about 100 Km from Ahmedabad. However, Maruti Suzuki has made it clear that it will continue its operations at its Manesar plants and will not shift from Haryana because of the recent incidents. Gujarat plant will server as an expansion for Maruti Suzuki and not as an alternative to its operations in Haryana. We will keep you posted on the latest updates, stay tuned to Car Blog India.
via- ET
