, the first consumption centre developed in , covers 3.15 million square feet of space and houses retail, entertainment, commercial and residential complexes.

Today High Street Phoenix boasts the reputation of being the flagship for fledgling shopping and entertainment hubs across the country.

The Phoenix Mills Limited successfully converted a defunct, disintegrating textile mill into the highly productive High Street Phoenix, now regarded as 's premier lifestyle destination.

High Street Phoenix has become a model for the rest of the country in terms of retail led development centers. From haute couture at Quorum to monthly household shopping at Big Bazaar, SF Jeans and Lifestyle, High Street Phoenix boasts of a completely congenial environment. There's something here for everyone.

The predominantly retail-led High Street Phoenix soon joined forces with Galaxy Entertainment and The Bowling Co., Mumbai's largest bowling alley and gaming arcade, to add the crucial element of entertainment to the burgeoning complex. The latest attraction is an 8-screen PVR cinema multiplex. Food and beverages are available in the form of fine dining restaurants like 'Monza' and 'Lemon Grass Café offset by 'chaat' stalls. Bars like 'The Sports Bar' and 'Brew Bar' and discotheques like „Ra' and 'Aaziano' are popular nightspots within the complex.

Company History - Phoenix MillsPrint YEAR EVENTS 1905 - The Company was Incorporated at Mumbai.

- The Company's object is to manufacture cotton textile goods. The products manufactured include bed-tickings, drills, coatings, leno-shirtings, mercerised and bleached dhoties, bleached and mercerised and printed voiles, chintz, handkerchief, surgical cotton wool and absorbent lint, bleached and dyed chaddars. The Mills are equipped to do bleaching dyeing, mercerising, printing and calendering. The Company also has a copper roller engraving plant, a foundry and a workshop.

1947 - 16,000 bonus equity shares issued in the prop. 2:1.

1948 - 24,000 Bonus equity shares issued in the prop. 1:1.

1966 - 16,000 Bonus equity shares issued in the prop. 1:3.

1969 - 8,000 Bonus equity shares issued in the prop. 1:8.

1972 - The Company purchased Deepchand Mills, Ujjain. It started manufacturing grey cloth, part of which was being processed in the Mumbai unit. The Ujjain unit was sold to Indore Textile Ltd. on 10th February, 1977.

1975 - 48,000 Bonus equity shares issued in the prop. 2:3.

1987 - The Company came under the provisions of the Sick Industrial Companies (Sp. Provisions) Act, 1985 due to erosion in its networth. Between 1988-89 to 1992-93, the company continued to be a potentially sick unit.

1995 - 1,25,000 No. of equity shares allotted at par to the promoters.

1996 - The company has alloted 1,25,000 No. of equity shares of Rs. 100/- each, at par, as a result of which the paid up share capital of the company stands enhanced to Rs.2.45 crores.

- During the year Company has made two subsidiary companies viz. Exotic Finvest Pvt. Ltd., and Bellona Finvest Ltd., A statement on subsidiary companies as required u/s 212 of the Companies Act, 1956 is annexed to the accounts.

- Installation of high efficiency motors. Installation of capacitors and condensers on electrical distribution system.

- During the year the company installed and commissioned Thermo pack and Steam pack boilers.

- The company proposes to have a R & D department.

1998 - The conflict between the workers' unions that forced the closure of Phoenix Mills for the last three days, has been defused with the intervention of the Labour Minister.

- Work at the mill was stopped on April 6, after a notice was posted at the entrance saying only those workers who had signed an agreement between the management and Rashtriya Mill Mazdoor Sangh (RMMS) could enter the premises.

1999 - PHOENIX Mills Ltd has been declared no longer sick by the Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (BIFR).

- The company has modernised the spinning section and is producing quality yarn instead of taking up job work which it was doing before.

- Phoenix Mills has modernised the processing unit in phases during the last five years and diversified the product mix by introduction of synthetic and hosiery processing with 100 per cent job work for exporters and introduced cost saving measures such as energy conservation, tightening of material purchase management and reduction in direct labour cost.

2000 - The Company has approved preferential issue of equity shares to the FIIs.

2003

Mr Saghan Srivastava has been appointed as Company Secretary of the Company wef November 15, 2003.

2007

-Phoenix Mills Ltd has appointment of Shri. Atul A Ruia as the Joint Managing Director of the Company.

2008

- The Company has splits its face value from Rs10/- to Rs2/-.

2009

- The Phoenix Mills Limited has appointed Ms. Minal Bhate- Dandekar as the Company Secretary of the Company with effect from August 17, 2009.

Phoenix Mills - because the story must be told

This was a long overdue post. I‟ve been wanting to do it ever since my Mill Land Blogs (links in the sidebar). Then I stumbled on this brilliant and well-researched case-study by Shekhar Krishnan. My post is based almost entirely on that report, which was done for the Girangaon Bachao Andolan and Lokshahi Hakk Sanghatana in April 2000.

Cross-reference on the Phoenix Mill issue can also be found in the submissions of the Girni Kamgaar Sangharsh Samiti (GKSS) to the High Court in the Mill Land case. (para 195[ii], page289, PIL Writ Petition No. 482 of 2005). (The 368-page Oct-05 High Court judgement can be downloaded here).

Incorporated in 1905, Bitia Mills was later christened as Phoenix Mills and is located in Lower Parel, Bombay. What follows next is how “High Street Phoenix” was born. Or how Phoenix Mills was killed. Its story is proof of how some mill-owners bended laws to shut down their mills, siphon off funds and cast aside their workers like an unnecessary liability. It‟s a story that needs to be told.

I‟ll start with an extract from Meera Menon and Neera Adarkar‟s comprehensive and moving book – One Hundred Years, One Hundred Voices. The book is about the history of Bombay‟s Mill Lands (Girangaon) as seen through the eyes of one hundred of its inhabitants.

Gangadhar Chitnis (73 years). General Secretary of the Girni Kamghar Union. Excellent academic record, joined the Communist Party as a fulltime worker. Worked with S. A. Dange in the GKU.

“Bitia Mills had a lot of women, at least 1,200 in the reeling and winding departments. In 1938, the mill management increased the workload by asking each woman worker to handle two wheels instead of one. The women went on strike. They gheraoed the manager and Ruia, the owner. That was the first time gherao had been used as a weapon by the workers. They sat down on the stairs outside Ruia’s office and wouldn’t allow anyone in or out. Morarji Desai was the Home Minister in the Provisional government then. Morarji was totally anti-communist, anti- worker and pro-capitalist. He could not tolerate this action by the women. He asked the police to move in, but he was warned that there would be a bloodbath, so he withdrew and invited both parties to the negotiating table. Then the union leaders got Ruia out of the office. There was no settlement so the mill went on strike and in support, all other mill-workers also went on strike. Known as the Bitia Mills Strike, it was historic because of the role played by women. People collected money and food from the neighbouring chawls for the striking workers. Subash Chandra Bose came to Bitia Mills to support the struggle. There was no road in front of the mill the, where there is now Tulsi Pipe Road (Senapati Bapat Marg). There was a paddy field. That is where the meeting took place. It was raining on that day. The workers were all holding umbrellas. Then Dange said, “Subhash-babu wants to see all of you, but all he can see is umbrellas.” In a moment all the umbrellas closed, and the workers stood in the rain. Subash- babu was taken aback.”

Yes, all of that happened on the same ground where cars are parked today, on the same ground that the Bowling Alley exists today and on the same ground where scores of people shop today. Remember that the next time you‟re at “High Street Phoenix”.

Timeline to destruction: 1977: A fire destroys the Blower Department of Phoenix Mills. The entire four-storey structure was razed to the ground. No cause was established. The Mill was closed for three years and 700 mill workers and 400 office staff were rendered jobless.

1979: Govt of Maharashtra sanctions a rehab scheme, which included development of a commercial complex. Funds generated from this were specifically to be used for revival of the mill. The mill was never revived and relief schemes never implemented. Workers were not paid their dues and work was not restarted.

1982: The great textile mill strike. Phoenix Mills management moves to declare their mills as “sick”. Work is shifted/outsourced to the unorganised powerloom sector. It is also alleged that shortly after this strike, the land-scams begin. Sai Motor Services currently today stands on the land that used to be the workers canteen.

1984: Govt attempts another relief and revival scheme. The Mill was allowed to develop 69,085 sq. mt for office space and 22,400 sq. mt was converted from industrial use to residential use. The Mill takes back 1,200 workers released after the strike. But, all are taken on badli (temporary) basis including erstwhile permanent workers.

1995: Yet again, the mgmt moves to declare the mill as sick and approaches the BIFR. The approved revival scheme allows tax concessions. Mgmt is directed to upgrade machinery and constitute a committee accountable to banks and financial institutions to oversee the modernisation and revival process. Once these tax concessions were approved, no revival scheme was implemented.

23rd April 1998 – The mgmt applies to the BMC for adding recreational facilities such as table tennis, health clubs and – of course - bowling alleys. On the grounds that its workers are “continuously demanding these facilities, and went on agitation in Jan-98”. Yes – workers demanding bowling alleys, sauna steam baths and billiards tables.

April and May 1998 – Mgmt begins to terminate services of staff across various departments. The processing dept is closed abruptly. Second and third shift at the Mills are stopped.

July 1998 – Labour Court issues an order to the Mill to restart closed departments and reinstate workers. Workers allege that just before the orders, mgmt had introduced a voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) for retrenched workers. In the meantime Phoenix Towers is constructed over what unions allege was space reserved for a municipal school and a public garden. Not a single paisa from these constructions goes to the workers.

Early-1999 – Phoenix Mills submits a report that it is no longer sick (i.e. turned net-worth positive). Till date, no one knows how.

Epilogue - May 1999 – Bowling Company opens at Phoenix Mills. This is an extract from their profile – “So many options, so little time. Presenting, ladies and gentlemen – The Bowling Company – India‟s premier leisure centre. 30,000 square feet of state-of-the-art fun – that‟s a first for Mumbai, we can tell you”.

The history of Bombay's Mill Lands is one that has not been largely told. And one that has been easily forgetton. All in the name of progress, in the name of redevelopment and freeing up of land seen as essential to bring down the sky-high property prices in Bombay, and in the name of making Bombay a financial hub like Singapore, Hong Kong, etc.

My attempt is to document what I can. So that we (or at least I) never forget the history of the grounds that have been cleared to make way for what stands today. As Santayana said "Those who forget the past, are condemned to repeat it".