Industry, not agriculture, can provide job to all: Pranab

Industry is a necessity today, as agriculture could not provide jobs to everybody, Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said here.

"There was a time, when agriculture alone could provide a livelihood, but times have changed. Now industry is a necessity for employment generation," Mukherjee said while inaugurating a forging plant of the Mackeil Group here in Burdwan district.

Stating that industrialisation began in West Bengal with Durgapur Steel Plant in the 1950s, he said in the past several decades, industrialisation drive had not been strong. It was good, he said, that now both the government and private sector were willing to set up industry.

Mukherjee urged industrialists to set up training centres, so that local people, particularly land losers due to industry, were trained for jobs.

With the plant, Mackeil group, a conglomerate dealing in manufacture of heavy engineering products mainly in the eastern region, made its foray into forging industry with an investment of Rs 700 crore.

Mackeil group Chairman P Chakraborty said the plant would produce all grades of forgings like high carbon and high chromium and stainless steel and would meet supply requirements of core industries, including power, coal, steel, oil and gas, railways, defence besides, cement and gear.