Vadodara: After producing 1.2 million cars here, General Motors(GM) India is today shutting down its plant permanently at Halol in Central Gujarat.

General Motors had purchased Halol plant from Hindustan Motors in 1990s. Halol plant had first produced Opel Astra car in 1996. On the last day of this plant which is today, the company is going to manufacture 72 cars. The plant has annual capacity to manufacture 1,27,000 cars.

There are two reasons for winding up the operation at Halol. One is shrinking market share of GM in India’s car market, the other reason is labour dispute.

As many as 900 employees of GM Halol had gone on strike on 16 March 2011. In 2010 company saw four-day strike in the month of October. Another strike was witnessed in this plant in 2014.

Due to frequent labour disputes, GM was in talk with Chinese automobile firm to sell the Halol plant without liability of employees. Unionism, strikes, labour movement activities has forced Chinese firm to rethink about taking over Halol plant.

DeshGujarat