Despite assurances of protection from the Left Front state government, the Mukesh Ambani-controlled Reliance Retail has begun re-routing its inventories meant for the yet-to-open stores in Kolkata to other states.
Following a spate of attacks on its stores by the Forward Bloc (a member of the ruling Front), the Opposition Trinamool Congress and BJP, the company has stopped work on readying its stores.
Last week, chief secretary Amit Kiran Deb assured Reliance of ?all sorts of protection? and ordered the police to pursue all the first information reports (FIRs) lodged with it. Some people were also picked up for questioning. Reliance, however, has stopped work on the vandalised stores.
The Reliance spokesperson in Kolkata, Kalyan Sarengi, declined to comment on the issue. But sources said that much of the inventory was being re-routed to its stores already doing business in the neighbouring state of Jharkhand and elsewhere. Some stock is also being sent back to the dealers.
Typically, a 4,000-sq ft Reliance store has more than 5,000 stock-keeping units (SKUs), and bigger ones are designed to stock more than 7,500 SKUs. ?Most of the Reliance shops in Kolkata have the capacity to stock 7,500 FMCG SKUs and 280 food & beverage SKUs. They also have more than 150 frozen items like cheese and butter that have a very short shelf-life,? said an insider. ?Normally we procure items with a shelf-life of at least three to six months. But it is wiser to send inventories to other centres to minimise losses,? he said.
From July, Reliance started sending inventories to its six stores in and around Kolkata: at Vishnu Enclave in Tollygunj, Ekta Heights at Bagha Jatin, Utsa Complex, Cinema Swabhumi, Nanda Mullick Lane and Barasat Colony. The one at Vishnu Enclave is the largest, covering an area of 9,030 sq ft. However, these stores were vandalised. ?We have not yet received any communication from the government,? said the source. ?We are ready to have talks with the government but they are yet to call us,? he added.