Birla: Welcome aboard

Calcutta/Mumbai, Feb. 6: The grandfather got his way, after all. Kumar Mangalam Birla will honour grandfather B.K. Birla?s wish to join the board of Century Textiles and Industries. The decision puts to rest years of speculation on who would eventually pick up the reins once Basant Kumar Birla retires.

Kumar will join the Century board tomorrow as a director, while grandfather B.K. Birla will continue as the chairman of the company.

?It is a very happy occasion for me. He (Kumar) will be inducted as a director on Tuesday,? an elated B.K. Birla told The Telegraph.

The development follows the untangling of the Birla group investment outfit, Pilani, where BK and Kumar, the chairman of the AV Birla group, took a controlling stake in August last year.

Their combined holding went up to 52 per cent after the GP-CK Birla group and SK Birla sold majority of their holdings in Pilani to the BK-Kumar duo.

Pilani Investment and Industries Corporation holds a 36.39 per cent stake in Century Textiles apart from a significant stake in Hindalco, Grasim and Kesoram Industries.

The octogenarian BK wants Kumar to take charge of Century Textiles and Century Enka, while flagship Kesoram Industries will go to daughter Majushree. B.K. clarified that Kumar would also join the board of the chemical company, Century Enka, later.

Promoter?s holding stood at 42.93 per cent in Century as on December 31, 2005. Apart from Pilani, Kesoram Industries, Orient Papers and Industries and Birla Corporation hold significant stakes in the company.

Century started its journey way back in 1897 as Cotton Textile Mills. It has diversified into three divisions ? textiles, cement and pulp and paper. The textile (cotton) units are located in Mumbai, Satrati (Madhya Pradesh). The rayon unit is located at Kalyan (Maharastra).

In 1974, the company diversified into cement by setting up a unit at Rajpur, Chhattisgarh. Today it has four units in three states totalling a capacity of 6.3 million tonne.