The light electrical engineering industry

The light electrical engineering industry at present r a wide range of products including general utility fa lamps, batteries, refrigerators, conditioners and motor Electric fans industry commenced in the year 1921, a since then has made a remarkable and steady progre Electric lamp industry has made good progress es] cially since indeP7ndence, though it was established earli i.e., in the year 1932. The range of production inclue miniature lamps for torches, automobiles, cycle dynam fluorescent tubes, mercury vapour lamps and bulbs. Muml and Kolkata are the largest centres of production.

Production of dry and storage batteries started in t 1930s but got a fillip during the Second World War. Stora batteries are mainly required for motor vehicles, tr, lighting, posts and telegraphs apparatus and power house as well as batteries for traction.

Machine tools form the basis for the manufacture industrial machinery, defence equipment, automobiles, ra way engines and electrical machinery. The range of IT chine tools now being manufactured in India covers su items as lathes, drilling machines, gear bobbers and ge shapers, boring machines, slothing machines, unit he, power hammers, mechanical and hydraulic presses, we] ing machines, furnaces and rolling mills.

Hindustan Machine Tools (HMT), a public sector u dertaking located in Bangalore, is the pioneering and t largest manufacturer of machine tools in the country. It w set up in 1953 in collaboration with the Swiss and t production started in 1956. The multi-unit company produces a wide range of machines like printing machinel lamp-making machinery, high precision lathes, radial driing machines, gears, etc. Two units are located at Bangalore and the others at Pinjore (Haryana), Kalamassery (Kerala), Ajmer and Hyderabad.

Besides HMT, other producers are the Machine Tool Corporation of India set up in 1967 in collaboration with the Czech government at Ajmer; Instrumentation Ltd., having a plant at Kota for precision instruments and one for mechanical instruments at Palakkad (Kerala) set up with financial and technical assistance from the former USSR government; the Heavy Machine Tools Plant .set up at Ranchi with Czech assistance for production of radial drilling machines, double column planning machines, cen­trallathes, etc.; the Praga Tools Ltd. of Secunderabad under defence administration mainly meant for producing highly sophisticated defence equipments; the National Instruments Factory at Kolkata which produces precision instruments such as drawing instruments, office equipment, survey instruments, binoculars and blood pressure equipments. There are also several private sector units dispersed all over the country with a greater concentration at Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi, Chennai, Bangalore and Coimbatore.