Against the total trained students of 24,725, only 8,539 students, i.e. 34.5 per cent were placed in the industry till July 2012. This emerged at the two-day workshop organized by the Apparel Training and Design Centre (ATDC) for ATDC-SMART project. SMART (Skills for Manufacturing Apparel through Research & Training) state coordinators and key officials took part in the workshop.
The facts surfaced that enrolling is not a problem as 47 per cent of enrolments have already been achieved in the current year target of 34,000. Rajasthan, one of the very strategic hubs of garment export, showed maximum placements while Bangalore, another important centre, was second. Hubs like Okhla (Delhi), Ludhiana, Thiruvananthapuram, Hyderabad and Raipur have less than 9 per cent placement each. It were the smaller centres which were not critical to export but catering to domestic scenario where placements were very low; probably the exporters value the skilled operators while domestic manufacturers work with tailors.
Dr. A Sakthivel, Chairman, AEPC and Dr. Darlie O’ Koshy, DG & CEO of ATDC interacted and discussed very deeply with various coordinators of the centres who promised them more. Lack of awareness, branding and mobilization campaign, and multi skilling of the candidates are some of the problems being faced in implementation of SMART project.
