Carrying Dhirubhai’s vision forward

Mumbai:
31 October 2002

The company's accounts for the year ended 31 March 2002, along with the directors' and auditors' report, a letter to shareholders and management discussion and analysis, have already been circulated to you. With your permission, I would like to take them as read .

Tribute
I address you today for the first time as the chairman and managing director of your company. Memories of all the past annual general meetings of Reliance are floating in my mind. In each of these meetings, I sat by the side of my father, Shri Dhirubhai Ambani, founder chairman of Reliance.

His scintillating wit, disarming humour, inspiring voice, charming laughter, the unbreakable bond between you and him — all these are coming back to my mind. I can feel as if he is sitting there, smiling and talking to me and to all of you. I hear him telling me: 'Sitting before you are members of my huge family — The Reliance Family. They gave me enormous respect and affection as the head of the family. And in return, I took care of them. Now, you are in my place. You have the responsibility to protect and promote their interest.“

Dhirubhai achieved the miracle known as Reliance with your unflinching support. I am confident of your continuing and wholehearted support. And I promise that we will take Reliance to greater heights. We will do everything to enhance the value of your investments in the long run and to give you good returns in the short run. I am acutely conscious of the duty he has entrusted me with, the values he has bequeathed, the task he has set and the vision he has outlined. I derive enormous strength from what I have learnt from him and look to the future with determination and confidence.

Performance review:
a) Operating performance
You will be happy to know that Reliance performed resiliently in an environment characterised by constraints on global economic growth, demand-supply imbalances in virtually every sector and volatility in energy, petrochemical feedstock and product markets. This performance was achieved on the strength of global competitiveness of Reliance's operations, leadership in domestic markets and healthy presence in export markets. All major plants operated at over 100-per cent capacity utilisation, setting new records in production volumes.