India’s Somani Cement to build new plant

Somani Cement Company Ltd. is planning to set up a new 360,000tpa cement plant in India’s Gujarat state, the firm’s managing director said on Monday.  The company will invest about 1.5 billion rupees to build the plant in Mahuva in Gujarat’s Bhavnagar district and has obtained a mining license for about 680 hectares of limestone fields, Bimlesh Mishra, Somani Cement’s managing director, told Reuters.  He said the company was in talks with a non-resident Indian group for raising funds for the plant which will start production by 2007.  "It’s too early to say whether the group would take equity in the company or not. We are in talks," he said.

Associated Cement Company Ltd. (ACC.BO) has conducted a geological survey for the project and will provide Somani Cement with technical and engineering support, Mishra said.  Somani Cement has a cement manufacturing plant in Gujarat’s Karsaliya-Jitpur that manufactures around 100,000 tonnes of lime pozolone and port land cement.