New Delhi: Creambell, one of India's top four ice-cream brands, is planning a foray in the east with a plant in Asansol and innovative flavours such as Mishti doi with Alfonso, Mishti doi in rabdi and caramel flavours and blueberry doi.

"We have launched our Asansol plant last month which will be producing both dairy products and ice-cream and intend to make it our fulcrum ... we have till now mainly been in the ice-cream business and this is our first milk plant in India," said Nitin Arora, CEO of Devyani Food Industries, which owns the Creambell brand.

India has a Rs 12,000-crore ice-cream and frozen foods market, with just 45 per cent in the organised sector.

Creambell has a near 4 per cent share of the market compared with market leader Amul, which has a 13 per cent share. However, the market is attracting a lot of attention as it is still growing rapidly at about 12 per cent annually despite a slowdown in overall GDP growth in the country.

The spotlight was on the sector last month when Lotte scooped up Havmor, India's seventh largest ice cream brand, for Rs 1,020 crore in an all-cash deal.

Arora said the firm had pumped in Rs 150 crore in the first phase of the Asansol plant and it has plans to invest more to try push up their position in eastern India from "number two or three to number 1".

Kwality Walls and Mother Dairy are ahead in eastern India. "We will be using the plant to sell ice-cream and frozen food products in Bengal, Jharkhand, Orissa and the Northeast ... but the dairy plant which will produce milk and plain curd besides the more exotic flavours will feed the catchment area of around Asansol, Dhanbad and other 15 satellite towns."

The firm decided to concentrate on eastern India as it found the market relatively less serviced. "We feel there is huge scope for growth in eastern India. Asansol was the obvious choice as it not only capable of servicing Calcutta but a chain of cities in the steel and coal belt," said Arora.