BRIDGING HERITAGE TO TECHNOLOGY

Pragun Jindal Khaitan, Vice-Chairman and Managing Director, Jindal Aluminium Limited, takes us through the story of Jindal Aluminium – a story which is rooted in building upon a rich heritage whilst embracing the new and the sustainable.

- Kruti Bharadva

A journey which began in 1968, when alumini-um was relatively unknown in India, to 2021, when the company- India’s largest alumini-um extrusion company is on the threshold of adopting digital solutions across all its business functions – Pragun Jindal Khaitan, Vice-Chairman and Managing Director, Jindal Aluminium Limited, takes us through the story of Jindal Aluminium – a story which is rooted in building upon a rich heritage whilst embracing the new and the sustainable.

Jindal Aluminium is a family-run business with a rich heritage. Please tell us about the company’s roots and background and how Dr. Sitaram Jindal sowed the first seed of Jindal Aluminium

My grandfather, Dr Sitaram Jindal, is the fourth of five brothers who jointly set up an industrial empire unparalleled in modern India. While studying at Kolkata (then Calcutta) University, he worked with his brothers towards setting up a steel pipe factory. After establishing the factory in Kolkata, he and his brother set up a giant steel pipe factory (Jindal India Ltd) in Hissar, Haryana. Back then, this was one of the first companies to manufacture steel pipes and tubes on a large scale in India. Since the initial period, the company played a vital role in the green revolution by manufacturing and supplying larger diameter steel pipes for use in the sinking of tube wells needed for irrigating in Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, and Rajasthan. It was the time of an acute shortage of food grains in India.

Post this success, he envisioned a future beyond steel and wanted to do something that could lay the foundation for another vital industry fuelling growth, and the foundation of now ‘Jindal Aluminium Limited’ was laid in 1968 (It is to be noted, the company was incorporated in 1970). Aluminium was relatively a new metal at that time.