'We Will Deliver For India' Says Vedanta's Anil Agarwal After PM Modi's Save Forex Call

After PM Narendra Modi urged citizens to switch to public transport, and reduce fuel usage, Vedant Group's Founder Anil Agarwal said his conglomerate will deliver for India.

In a recent X post, the mining billionaire said, "I fully empathise with Prime Minister @narendramodi's appeal to save foreign exchange in this time of crisis and uncertainty."

On ways to protect the South Asian country's forex, he said, "One way to do this is to consume less. The other way is to produce more. PM's pain points are oil and gold, India's two biggest imports, more than 30% of the total. If you add other resources from below the ground, it becomes 50%."

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"Given our geology and our existing assets, we can massively increase production quickly. It has happened in past. Two things are required: privatisation and self-certification in clearances,"

Emphasising on privatisation, he noted, "Overall, in the below-the-ground sector, there are 24 PSUs which can be privatised and will result in manifold increase in production. Completing the privatisation of companies like HZL (govt holds 26%) and BALCO (govt holds 49%) will also result in much more output and jobs."

"When Vedanta acquired HZL in 2002, India was import-dependent for zinc. Today, we are self-reliant. With exactly the same assets. We did R&D and started producing silver and lead, which no one had imagined. And now we are in the process of doing R&D to produce rare earths," he said.

This comes after there were reports circulating that claimed the centre was considering shelving three planned privatisation sales ​amid weak investor appetite.

He also noted that the centre should "trust the private sector to entirely eliminate any vulnerability on account of imports of oil, gold, silver, copper, fertiliser, and many other resources."