Govt mill bleeds as outages wreak havoc on production

COIMBATORE: If you thought power cutswere crippling only private industries in Coimbatore, just take a peek into oneof the oldest government-run mills in the cotton city. The 81-year-old Sri Ranga Vilas mill on Avinashi road is faced with its worst crisis. Yarn orders are pouring in for the National Textile Corporation- run mill, but 16,320 spindles lie idle. Half the 140 staff on evening shift hang around listlessly after 6 pm daily, when the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board's curbs on peak hour supply comes into force. "Our production drops to60 per cent every evening. Only 25,000 spindles work in the evenings the rest ofthem are idle because of the regulations in power supply," says G.Chandra Mouli,General Manager, Sri Ranga Vilas Ginning, Spinning and Weaving Mills.Sri Ranga Vilas is one among the five government-run mills inCoimbatore. Started in 1922 by the P S Govindasamy Naidu family, the mill wasnationalised in 1970. Since then, the mill has been fumbling along, selling itsvast properties in the city. The mill now incurs a loss of Rs 1.35lakh daily because of the power cut. While its 41,320 spindles can produce 8.8tonnes daily, presently it spins out only 8.2 tonnes. The mill manages thisproduction by purchasing 700 kw of power daily from private operators at doublethe TNEB's charge of Rs 4.50 per unit and also by operating a generator. "Howcan we run the mill with seven hours of power outage daily?" asks a mill staff.The mill has spent Rs 10.2 crore on power expenses in therecently-ended fiscal, while its unaudited turnover was just about Rs 55 crore.And, its losses have piled up to Rs 22.76 crore. "Because of the power crisis,we have not taken up any export orders. For, we cannot meet the strict deadlinesof the exporters," says Chandra Mouli. Also, as the machines areelectronically-controlled, the sudden power shut down results in technicalsnags, the staff complains. "When there is a power cut, the winding thread snapsoff and joining up the thread takes at least 45 minutes in each of the spindle,leading to huge delays in production," says a technician. If thepower crisis continues, the cotton city may just lose another of its governmentmills and a textile landmark.