Big steel, cement firms operating as a cartel,says Gadkari

Union Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari is pitching to place a regulator for the steel and cement industry sectors. Big players in the steel and cement industry are indulging in cartelisation to jack-up prices, he said. It will be difficult to achieve Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream of making India a USD 5 trillion economy if the steel and cement prices keep going up, Gadkari said, pointing out the target of investing Rs 111 lakh crore on infrastructure projects in the next five years to aid the economy.

Stating that all the players in the steel industry have their own iron ore mines, and do not have to face any hikes in labour or power rates, he wondered how the steel industry has been hiking prices.He said the cement industry is exploiting the situation by hiking up the prices, and underlined that the stance of both the industries is not in the national interest, given the infrastructure spends lined up. Addressing the Builders Association of India (BAI) event in Mumbai he said that the government is in the process of finding out the solution for that. BAI also requested for a mechanism for the early release of bills against the government contracts, streamlining in GST implementation, and royalty payment to be taken care by the state governments during the meeting with the minister.