The government went out of its way to help the turn-around of Jessop and the rest is history. The company made profits, declared dividends, announced bonus and took up expansions. The road to revival was so well structured that the state promised all help if the group took over the closed Dunlop.
I was summoned by the Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and the Industry Ministry, Nirupam Sen to direct me to see that the group takes an interest to take over Dunlop, as they have information that the group having the majority shares in the company is interested in selling the company as the owner Manohar Rajaram Chhabria based in Dubai died in2002. Sumitomo Corporation of Japan who owned the brand overseas has shown interest but they were more into arm twisting as they had rights on the brand globally.
I conveyed the information to Pawan Ruia, Chairman of Ruia Group who had taken over Jessop and the Group negotiated the purchase of Dunlop India Ltd, Falcon Tyres Ltd and India Tyres in 2005 from the Dubai-based Jumbo Group for a reported 2 billion rupees.
The Government of West Bengal extended all help and I could get a waiver of outstanding on electricity, municipal tax and obtained other benefits but none depriving the past dues of the workers.
This paved the way for the re-opening of Dunlop in October 2006. Production started in November 2006 and it ventured to revive the manufacture of aircraft and military tank tyres, as it was the only company to manufacture same before closure. During 1971 war with Pakistan and the creation of Bangladesh, Dunlop supplied tyres to the army.
In 1936 the pneumatic tyres manufacturer Dunlop opened its first factory in India.. It was the first tyre manufacturing plant in the Asian continent. Spread across 97 hectares, Sahaganj’s plant employed over 12,000 workers to manufacture car and aeroplane tyres.
Dunlop was the world leader in the pneumatic tyres industry, and the Sahaganj plant was its Asian most prominent symbol. It was no surprise that in 1980, Prince Charles, a 32-year-old bachelor at the time, drove down there to visit the Dunlop plant as the company founded in Dublin in 1889, bore the name of John Dunlop, who had re-designed the first pneumatic tyre for his child’s tricycle.
