In an effort to turn India's largest zinc producer into one of the top companies in the world, Hindustan Zinc Ltd.'s chairman Priya Agarwal Hebbar announced on Thursday that production of zinc, which is used in everything from batteries to medications, will increase to 1.5 million tonnes.

She stated during the company's annual shareholders meeting that Hindustan Zinc's comeback tale will have its own chapter when the economic history of 21st-century India is written.

Incorporated as a public sector firm in 1996, the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led NDA government in August 2002 sold a controlling stake in the firm to Vedanta group firm Sterlite Industries for around Rs 769 crore.

Hindustan Zinc is today the second largest zinc-lead miner in the world after Swiss firm Glencore and the fourth largest zinc-lead smelter globally. It has now also broken into the top 10 list of silver producers in the world.