NEW DELHI - India‘s top carmaker Maruti Suzuki may resume production late August at a factory closed last month after a deadly riot by workers, a company executive said Sunday.

The company‘s board is likely to meet on Monday to consider a reopening date for the plant where a manager was killed and 96 other supervisors were injured in the unrest, the senior executive added. Late August may be „a realistic target“ for relaunching operations at the Manesar factory just south of New Delhi which has been shut since the violence on July 18, the executive told AFP.

„Some reports from the police and special investigations are likely to come to Maruti on Monday and some decisions are likely to come afterwards,“ the executive, who did not wish to be named, added. He could not say when a public announcement might be made.

Maruti, majority-owned by Japan‘s Suzuki Motor, is India‘s largest car company by sales. It is losing some US$9 million a day from the plant shutdown, analysts calculate. The board will review security at the plant as well as the physical state of the riot-damaged facility, the executive told AFP. Maruti locked out its 3 000 workers at the plant that produces 550 000 cars a year, or 40 percent of the company‘s output, three days after the riot.

The plant has witnessed several industrial disputes but none as violent as last month‘s clash. Workers chased managers with iron rods and car parts, smashing limbs and torching areas of the plant after a row between an employee and a supervisor, according to witnesses. A personnel manager, whose legs were broken, was unable to flee and burned to death in an office area.