The Hindu Business Line : Paswan supports steel price hike

THE Minister for Steel, Chemicals and Fertilisers, Mr Ram Vilas Paswan, on Wednesday came out in open support of the price hike effected by public sector steel manufacturers such as the Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) and Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (RINL), earlier this month.

Addressing the media at the Economic Editors' Conference here, Mr Paswan said that it was the "middlemen traders" who were benefiting from the lower steel prices offered by the Government companies and the consumers were not the actual beneficiaries because the difference in prices were taken away by them.

"So, neither the consumers were getting the benefit nor the producers were getting advantage of keeping prices low. Rather, traders were getting the advantage and, therefore, SAIL has rightly decided to increase the prices,'' he said.

However, he said the proposal of regulating steel prices would be taken up again in the next meeting of the Steel Consumers' Council.

The issue of regulating steel prices came up at the Consumer Council meeting, Mr Paswan said, and added that the Government is prepared with its proposal on steel price regulation and would place it before the Council at its meeting scheduled for the first week of December.

Stressing on the need to increase steel production to 100 million tonnes by 2020, he said that it would require an investment of around Rs 2 lakh crore for achieving that capacity.

"A committee has been formed under the Cabinet Secretary to look into all these matters before finalising the National Steel Policy,'' he said.