India is witnessing the shutting down of an automaker production unit. Honda Cars India Ltd (HCIL) has decided to pull the plug on production at its Greater Noida plant in Uttar Pradesh, sources said on Saturday.

The automaker, which is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Japanese Honda Motor Co, had set up the Greater Noida plant in 1997. Industry sources said that the plant would, however, continue to house the company’s corporate head office, spare parts division and research and development (R&D) centre among other functions. Meanwhile, the company declined to comment on the matter.

The automaker would now rely only on its Tapukara facility in Rajasthan to roll out its entire product range in the country, sources added.

HCIL had earlier this year initiated a voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) for its manufacturing line associates at the plant to increase productivity and efficiency.

The company used to roll out models like City, CR-V and Civic from the Greater Noida plant, which had a production capacity of one lakh units per annum.

The Tapukara facility, on the other hand, has an installed capacity of 1.8 lakh units per annum.
The plant also produces engines which are exported to other countries. HCIL had reported sales of 9,990 units in the domestic market in November, up 55 percent from 6,459 units in November 2019.

It is worthwhile to note that while Biden as the incoming POTUS is bringing the electric vehicles into the central place of economic and industrial policy to regenerate employment in US, India which was shown the Make in India dream is seeing the shutting down of automaker production unit, in the middle of a pandemic. All of these are occurring in a time when the economy is battered and when the farmers have hit the roads. It is more than clear that the economy and industry have gone into the winds and agriculture is being threatened by aggrandizing corporate lobbyists under the current regime in Delhi. The story of Honda is just a small chunk of the larger picture of the slow but effective deindustrialization in India.