Coronavirus: Godfrey Phillips India shuts three factories temporarily

Cigarettes and tobacco major Godfrey Phillips India have suspended manufacturing at its three factories in the wake of coronavirus pandemic, according to a top company official.

Terming the current situation as "extraordinary times", Godfrey Phillips India (GPI) CEO Bhisham Wadhera said the company is prepared to take a hit for four weeks on its business.

"As an organisation what is of utmost importance to us is our employees' health and safety. In fact about 10 days ago, we announced work from home just to ensure that nobody gets exposed, much before the lockdown," Wadhera told PTI.

He further said:"Apart from work from home, we also shut our manufacturing facilities so that people are safe and we are actually tracking them on a daily basis.

"People are writing in to us to say if they or their families are having any symptoms. I think that's going to be our prime concern even going forward."
On the financial impact of the pandemic on the company's business, he said,"See, I don't think we're too worried about the impact now because there's bound to be one, not only for us, but the entire country. Everybody's going to get impacted severely."
Wadhera further said: "We are assessing that already but as I said health and safety is of paramount importance to us and if we have to take a hit for four weeks, so be it...These are extraordinary times and we have to have extraordinary measures to deal with them."
He further said along with the impact of high taxation, "economic slowdown and the virus spread, I think it it too early to say what is going to happen because it has really been a double whammy for all of us."