Integration, both forward and backward, and a strong urge to be self-sufficient and self-reliant in the matter of feedstock and power, have always been part of the Sanmar group’s strategic planning. Its flagship company Chemplast Sanmar pioneered these concepts in this part of the world and this explains the fruitful investments it has made over the years in manufacture of industrial alcohol, and in power generation for captive use. The company’s decision to have its own source of salt supply followed the same chain of thought.
Salt water in the crystalliser is scraped and salt crystals are collected in the surrounding ridges at Chemplast Sanmar’s Vedaranyam Salt Works.
The sea is the largest source of common salt—lakes, rocks and mines being the other sources. In India, the chief supplier of salt is the sea. Vedaranyam and Adiramapatnam are two of its richest sources in Tamil Nadu. When Mahatma Gandhi launched a satyagraha against an unjust British tax on salt in 1930, Vedaranyam was the south Indian venue where C Rajagopalachari led the salt march.
The Vedaranyam swamp proved an ideal location for setting up salt works. The high density Vaisakham tides between mid-May and mid-September, combined with the south-westerly winds, push seawater over large areas of the swamp. The area is hedged on the south and east by the Kodiakkadu Reserve Forest. This protects the works and its property from tidal waves and dust storms. The place is also connected well by road and rail.
The Vedaranyam Salt Works of Chemplast Sanmar had its beginnings in the facility set up in 1942 by The Mettur Chemicals and Industrial Corporation Ltd. (MCIC) to supply salt to its caustic soda plant. That MCIC supplied chlorine for decades to Chemplast for its PVC plant until it became part of Chemplast Sanmar in 1988 is a well-known fact. To have the company’s own salt works made perfect sense, as twice as much salt as the desired quantity of caustic soda is required as raw material, and it also fitted in with the group’s emphasis on strategic integration.
The pumping station at the Point Calimere seaface.
Initially around 100 acres of salt land was taken up to produce high quality salt. Gradually as the company’s caustic soda capacity increased, around 3500 acres of salt land was acquired at
Vedaranyam along the side of the road to Point Calimere.
The Chemplast Sanmar Salt Works at Vedaranyam is an impressive spread of swamp land, spread over an area of 3,500 acres, with a capacity of nearly 1.3 lakh tons of salt per annum. Going round the vast expanse of salt ponds along the transportation pathways, a visitor is struck by the simple elegance, economy and efficiency of the operations. Here, it is imperative to work closely with the cycles of nature, and allow its forces to aid you in maximizing output. The labour force are village folk who approach their work with a devotion born of faith in nature and God.
Their raw material is seawater, pumped from Point Calimere or Kodiakkarai on the shores of the Palk Straits linking India and Sri Lanka, by means of the company’s own pumpsets. As the brine makes its way to the works, its concentration increases—following further rounds of pumping—from 2.5° Be (or gms per 100 cc) eventually to 24° by stages. When high winds blow—even in normal times, the wind attains a velocity of 45 kmph—the seawater flow is accelerated enough to facilitate switching off the pumpsets, thus saving on electric power.
Every season starts with a special puja, offered to Ganesa, the elephant god of good beginnings of the Hindu pantheon. Tradition dictates that the head of the enterprise perform it personally, accompanied by spouse. The first salt is scraped by senior personnel by their own hands and the initial output is offered ceremonially at a Hindu temple at Nagapattinam, the Nagoor dargah and the minor basilican church at Velankanni, in a spirit of religious harmony, not often seen elsewhere. The prasadam brought back from these places of worship is distributed among all the workers.
The work starts early. The workers, most of them residents of the nearby village, assemble at the work spot as early as 2.00 am sometimes, so that they can close work well before the sun gets really hot. The salt marsh is divided into hundreds of plots called crystallisers, where concentrated brine is allowed 12-15 days time to crystallise. During this period, the brine is agitated with rakes. Once the crystallisation is complete, the formed salt is removed by scraping.
The crystalliser area covers roughly 260 acres, out of which only 176 acres are used for salt formation, the rest being ridges, storage places, roads, channels, etc.
The brine not released to the crystallisers is stored in storage ponds, in which it remains open to the sky, the resultant evaporation helping to increase the concentration, sometimes to as high as 30° Be.
The ‘scrapers’ and ‘rakers’ are entirely different sets of workers, each a specialised activity. The scrapers were trained by workers from Thoothukudi when the Vedaranyam Salt Works was first established.
Bittern or mother liquor after salt has been separated from seawater which is converted to alkaline bromine solution at Vedaranyam and sent to Chemplast Sanmar, Mettur, where it is used in production of bromine.
The salt heaps are covered to protect
them against rain.
The puja at the beginning of the season
(From Chemplast Sanmar archives).
P S Jayaraman, Managing Director, and his wife
Rajeswari Jayaraman take part in the puja
(From Chemplast Sanmar archives).
Salt/ ABSOL production details from 1991-1992 to 2002-2003
Tonnage | ||
Year | Salt | ABSOL |
1991-1992 | 98895 | 80 |
1992-1993 | 88049 | 80 |
1993-1994 | 81196 | 95 |
1994-1995 | 80124 | 108 |
1995-1996 | 80125 | 90 |
1996-1997 | 74420 | 84 |
1997-1998 | 84491 | 98 |
1998-1999 | 60235 | 89 |
1999-2000 | 84953 | 85 |
2000-2001 | 113046 | 98 |
2001-2002 | 102884 | 101 |
2002-2003 | 128540 | 122 |