Report by Manorama Dhir, Bhubaneswar: Vedanta’s one million ton per annum alumina refinery in Odisha has announced to shut down with effect from 5th December 2012 after it had issued a three-month closure notice on the 5th of September this year. 

In spite of the Company’s top management having several rounds of meetings and discussions with the State Chief Minister and Chief Secretary for bauxite provision to the refinery, no concrete solution has been be arrived upon.   

With bauxite stock depleting to almost ‘zero level’, the Company is left with no other alternative but to shut down the refinery, whose closure is expected to affect around 7000 people engaged directly or indirectly with the plant. 

Dr. Mukesh Kumar, CEO of Vedanta confirming the development said, “Despite our concerted efforts over the past three months to ensure sustainable supplies of bauxite for our Lanjigarh refinery we have not been able to find any solution. For the last three days we have run the unit at around 20% of the capacity and on the 5th of December we have been forced to close down the unit due to dwindling stocks of bauxite.”