Date:09/05/2006 URL: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2006/05/09/stories/2006050904070300.htm

Back RIL to set up facility to train workmen

Kripa Raman

Acute scarcity of skilled labour for new 0Jamnagar project

Mumbai , May 8

Reliance Industries is in the process of setting up a facility to train up an estimated 8,000 welders, 5,000 carpenters, 5,000 pipefitters and a few thousand "grinders" and "mill wright fitters".

RIL needs trained workmen on a war-footing for its new refinery coming up at its Special Economic Zone in Jamnagar, that is scheduled to be operational by March 2008, said sources. And it is taking no chances with being faced with a shortage of skilled labour for its Rs 27,000-crore project.

RIL needs such an army of workers because its scheduling style is to crunch several years' work into a few months, and further, improve on the scheduling by compressing time on a continuous basis, they said.

The workmen will be trained at a Craft Training Institute which will be established for the purpose and for which Reliance has already advertised for a Dean and Academic Heads for all the disciplines. It is trying to tap the Industrial Training Institutes for training talent.

If at least 50 per cent of the trainees manage to win certification for their skills, it will ensure a steady stream of workmen for the company's project, said the sources.

If the frenetic commercial and industrial construction activity in the country has created a shortage of trained engineers, then the scarcity of skilled labour is even more acute.

"In fact, when we did our last refinery in Jamnagar, then too we set up a training institute," said an official. "We picked up local people trained them in welding and the like and gave them jobs on the project. After the project, a large number of them migrated to the Middle East."

But even then, the sources said, the realisation was that the numbers were not sufficient. "We have learned from past experience and are working on this matter right from the beginning."

RIL is into creating not just employment but "employability", says its advertisement for the institute. The certified workers will be absorbed by RIL's contractors and will work on the SEZ Jamnagar project for two years after which they will have experience of working with the "latest generation equipment and machinery imported from the best of world manufacturers".

"Thereafter, Reliance is confident that these skills which are badly required and have an unlimited market... present a great earning future."

RIL said it needed thousands of skilled, semi-skilled, partially skilled and unskilled persons from all over the country.