Gujrat Ambuja group to enter health sector

KOLKATA, MAY 30. With its presence in the housing infrastructure sector already established, the cement major Gujarat Ambuja group is now entering the health sector with a mother-child speciality hospital here.

``We are setting up a mother-child care hospital in Kolkata which should be open by August this year", Mr. Harshavardhan Neotia, a director of Gujarat Ambuja Cements, told PTI here. The Rs. 15 crore 65-bed hospital, he said, was almost complete and would be located in the centre of the city at Park Street-Rawdon Street crossing.

Mr. Neotia, however, made it clear that the setting up of the hospital, to be named after his grandmother, did not mean the group's future investments would be in the health sector. ``This is more of an emotional decision to set up a hospital in the city", he said. But he stressed that housing would continue to be the thrust sector for the group. After its successful foray into this vital sector in West Bengal it is going to make similar ventures in other parts of the country as well.

The company had already been shortlisted by the Punjab Government for a couple of major housing projects under joint venture in Mohali and other places, he said.

Expressing confidence about the growth prospects in the sector he said there was lot of scope as housing infrastructure is, `woefully inadequate' in the country.

The Gujarat Ambuja group had already set up a massive housing project in Kolkata through a joint venture company with the West Bengal Government and had also undertaken similar projects in Burdwan and Durgapur.

Mr. Neotia said the company was looking for expansion in the mass housing sector instead of going for niche housing where demand may be less.

About the company's main business of cement he said the group had set up a Rs. 135 crore cement plant at Sankrail in Howrah district of West Bengal, while a massive 2.5 million tonne plant at Chandrapur in Maharashtra and another at Bhatinda were coming up fast.

With these additions the total capacity of Ambuja Cement would be in the region of 11 million tonnes putting the company among the top four to five cement producers in the country, Mr. Neotia said.

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