Objective of the Department:

1. Combating industrial sickness in the State with the objective of resurrecting industrial units that have turned sick or weak or have been forced to close down following sickness.
2. Playing nodal role in restructuring of State PSEs.

The activities of this Department are:

• Playing facilitating role for the revival and rehabilitation of closed and sick industrial units (large/medium) with or without the intervention of the Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (BIFR) in the private & public sectors in the State by way of proactive guidance and co-ordinating the implementation of revival packages with the support of certain relief and concessions as laid out in the West Bengal Industrial Renewal Scheme, 2001 (WBIRS)
• Considering cases under the West Bengal Relief Undertakings (Special Provision) Act, 1972 (WBRU).
• Administering of State Public Sector Enterprises (SPSE) under administrative control of this Department.
• Co-ordinating recycling of idle /excess land of closed and sick industrial units to generate resources for investment in their revival efforts vis-a-vis setting up of new projects thereon by intending entrepreneurs to ensure continued productive use of such land resources.

A. Role in administering and restructuring of Public Sector Undertakings (Public Enterprises Wing):

Of the 13 SPSEs under the control of the Department in May 2011, 7 SPSEs were transferred under the administrative control of different Departments during 2013-14 and the SPSE namely Gluconate Health Limited (GHL) has been transferred to the Health & Family Welfare Department in January 2016. Currently 5 SPSEs namely Saraswaty Press Ltd (SPL), Durgapur Chemicals Limited (DCL), Neo Pipes & Tubes Co. Ltd. (NPT), National Iron & Steel Co. Ltd. (NISCO) and Lily Products Ltd. (LPL) are under the direct administrative control of this Department. Most of the companies are erstwhile sick Private Sector Units taken over by the State Government primarily with the objective of protecting employment of the workforce. However, over the years owing to a variety of reasons NPT, NISCO, LPL and DCL have fallen critically sick. The Government has decided to restructure NPT, NISCO and LPL. It has also stepped in to bail out DCL which is burdened with loan from Banks and Financial Institutions.

a. Saraswaty Press Ltd. (SPL) is an ISO 9001-2008 Quality System Certified Company. It was taken over by the Government of West Bengal in 1979. It has turned into a profit- making company over the years. SPL has recently gained order for printing of Digital Ration Cards for the Govt. of West Bengal. It is diversifying in the field of variable data printing & high technology hologram making with track & trace features being used for liquor bottles in West Bengal. SPL is a debt free company and is paying dividend to the Government regularly.SPL has a subsidiary company in the name of West Bengal Text Book Corporation Pvt. Ltd. (WBTBC) which was set up by the Government for production and distribution of school text books.

Financial performance of SPL (Rs. In Crore):

b. Durgapur Chemicals Ltd. (DCL) (incorporated in the year 1963 as a Government Company) is engaged in manufacturing and selling of chemicals like Caustic Soda lye, Chlorine, Hydrogen, Stable Bleaching Powder, etc.

Financial performance (Rs. in Crore):

c. National Iron & Steel Co. (1984) Ltd. [NISCO] : [Taken over by the State Government in 1984].

Financial performance (Rs. in Crore):

The company has suspended its manufacturing process since 2005. However at present it is engaged in limited trading activities.

d. Neo Pipes & Tubes Co. Ltd.: [Taken over from erstwhile National Pipes & Tubes Co. Ltd. on 1/4/1984].

Financial performance (Rs. in Crore):

The company has suspended its operation since October, 2014.

e. Lily Products Ltd.: [Taken over in 1996 by the State Government) The Company has suspended operation since 2005.

f. The issue of utilization of Work force of these 3 PSEs viz. NISCO, NPT and LPL has been taken care of without any job displacement (permanent & contractual) through the process of redeployment following the guideline issued under F.D. Memo No. 3161-F (P) dated 17.06.2014 and No. 3967-F (P) dated 01.08.2014. The employees of these three SPSEs which are being restructured have mostly been gainfully redeployed at different levels in the Government.

The following four Units are run as Joint Venture companies:

1. EMT Megatherm Pvt. Ltd. (Govt. share 26%)
2. .B.Agro-Textile Corporation Ltd. (Govt. share 26%)
3. W.B.Chemicals Ltd. (Govt. share 26%) and
4. The Lalit Great Eastern Hotels (Govt. share 10%)

B: Role in Revival of Central Public Sector Undertakings (CPSU) and private sector units (Industrial Reconstruction Wing):

'Industries' is a subject in the Union List of the Constitution of India. 'The Companies Act 1956', 'The Sick Industrial Companies (Special Provisions) Act 1985' and 'The Securitization & Reconstruction of Financial Assets and Enforcement of Security Interest Act 2002 (SARFAESI Act) form the legislative frame-work within which the State Government has to plan the initiatives for the sick & closed industries as per statute. Despite this, the State Government has planned a pro-active agenda for providing relief and support to the renewal of ailing industrial assets in the State. With this objective in view, the erstwhile Industrial Reconstruction Department initiated its own policy in March 2001 under the name of West Bengal Industrial Renewal Scheme 2001 (WBIRS 2001). This Department gradually experienced that relief/concession provided under the scheme could not materialize into a meaningful intervention in the complexcity of 'industrial sicknesses' as majority of the industrial units sought to swap their debts to Financial Institutions and Banks by utilizing the soft loans procured at substantially lower interest rates from the State Government under WBIRS 2001. Keeping this experience in view, it was decided in April 2003 that the State Government would restrict support measures to the extent of the following relief/concessions only that require no fresh budgetary outgoes from the State:

1. Re-schedulement of arrear sales tax dues by way of conversion into soft loan payable over a period of 11 years
2. Waiver of electricity duty for prospective 5 years
3. Remission of stamp duty and registration fee up to 50% for taking over assets of any closed unit for prospective revival by any new promoter
4. Disposal of surplus land assets held by a unit to generate resources for investment in its revival/rehabilitation efforts, strictly on consideration of merit.

1) Extension of Relief/concession in BIFR Cases

 This Department has so far considered all the eligible cases for extending admissible relief / concession as per the guidelines of West Bengal Industrial Renewal Scheme 2001 to sick companies in terms of BIFR sanctioned schemes in consultation with the Finance Deptt. and other relevant departments. The relief concessions have also been considered for 'weak' units that have incurred cash loss for two years in succession.

2) Administering of West Bengal Relief Undertaking (Special Provisions) Act 1972 :

 The matter of extension of legal protection by declaring eligible sick industries as 'Relief Undertaking' also considered by the Department under West Bengal Relief Undertaking (Special Provision) Act, 1972.

3) Preparation of Sick-industries Land Bank

• The Department has comprehended that a vast quantum of land is lying unutilised/under-utilised as those are in possession of sick/closed industrial units. Depending on such experience one time activity for creation of a Sick industries Land-bank to be created out of land lying idle / surplus in the sick/ closed units was undertaken and M/s PriceWaterhouseCoopers Pvt. Ltd. (PWC) was engaged for providing advisory assistance for development of a land bank consisting land locked in sick/closed industrial units in West Bengal. From the data contained in the 3rd interim report of PWC 23 cases have been taken up on the basis of land available in those industries. In the case of eighteen (18) units land identified by PWC as idle is 19506.13 acres and Surplus land is 8363.27 acres. Further 1681.51 acres of land is available with five (5) units under liquidation.
• A Group of Ministers (GOM) has been formed by the State Government to look into various aspects of closed industries and currently cases of two closed companies are under review.
• A Committee of Officials has been formed on the recommendation of the GOM for assisting the Group of Ministers constituted for the purpose of chalking out the road map for utilisation of land locked in closed industries. The Committee has been meeting at regular intervals for determining the course of action to be taken in respect of the parcels of land identified by the Group of Ministers.

4) Preparation of a new Scheme to consider relief /concession to the sick/weak/closed industries of this State :

Keeping in view the constraints of the Finance Department and the experience of dealing with the matters of industrial sickness before the BIFR, it has been felt that a New Scheme, having more flexibility in providing relief/concessions to the ailing industries needs to be formulated. Hence, a new scheme with modified and enhanced relief and concessions for sick and weak industries in the State is being formulated to replace the present WBIRS, 2001. The new scheme is expected to come into force in Financial Year 2016-17.

5) Recovery of outstanding loan:

The companies who have defaulted in repayment of Soft Loan / Bridge Loan are issued notices for repayment. In the year 2014-15, an amount of Rs. 3.21 Crore was recovered from defaulting companies.

6) Status of sick industrial units referred to BIFR from this State

The Board for Industrial & Financial Reconstruction (BIFR) primarily determines the measures in respect of industrial companies in the large/medium sector that have to report their 'sickness' to and are registered with this Board, upon a preliminary assessment of complete erosion of their net worth and formulates revival schemes to address respective causes of sickness under the 'Sick Industrial Companies (Special Provisions) Act 1985' after securing the consent of all stakeholders in respect of sacrifices necessitated. The Board also monitors implementation of the sanctioned scheme during implementation by the respective companies. So far, this Department has interfaced cases of industrial 'sickness' of 397 units registered with BIFR from this State. This includes 25 Central undertakings and remaining 372 units relate to the private sector.