India's finished steel consumption totaled 12.74 million mt in the first two months of the current fiscal year (started April 1), indicating a seven percent year-on-year increase, according to provisional estimates released by the Joint Plant Committee (JPC) which is part of India's Ministry of Steel. India’s consumption of total finished steel in May this year reached 7.23 million mt, increasing by 31.3 percent compared to May 2014.
According to the data, the country's finished steel production rose by a slight margin of 0.8 percent year on year to 15.31 million mt in the April-May period of the current year. Among the main producers, state-owned steel producer SAIL recorded a decrease of 1.8 percent year on year in finished steel production to 1.68 million mt, while the finished steel output of RINL rose by 1.4 percent to 431,000 mt and Tata Steel's finished steel output decreased by 4.8 percent to 1.4 million mt, both year on year.