Textile clusters face discomfort in shortage of workers

20 May '09

2 min read

That the business sentiment is improving can be gauged from the fact that, the power loom cluster in Bhiwandi is on the look out for skilled workers to man the powerloom machines in this textile weaving town.

Bhiwandi is not the only, town facing a labour shortage. Other textile clusters like Malegaon, Icchalkaranji and Igatpuri are facing the same pangs and have to face the discomfort of having to see their machines lying idle.

The textile industry is talking about an improved sentiment in the overall economy and say that the flow of orders has started increasing in the last few days, but the workers shortage is severely hampering their operations.

Nearly 400,000 skilled powerloom workers out of a workforce of nearly 1.2 million, mostly hailing from states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh had gone back to their homes.

This was on account of the agitation launched by a political outfit and also due to the economic downturn resulting in a slowdown of orders in the last few months and now the shortage is felt acutely by the sector in those towns.

To get an understanding of the situation, Fibre2fashion spoke to, “Mr. Faizan Azmi, President, Maharashtra State Powerloom Federation, who said, “Most of the workers working in powerloom sector are from UP, MP, Bihar, Tamil Nadu etc”.

He explained, “Approximately 400,000 workers from UP and Bihar have not come back from their native land, due to which the sector is facing loss of around 50 percent due to shortage of skilled labourers”.

He demanded that the government should be take care of the job security and safety of the labourers. Most of the powerlooms are now working on single shifts and have closed down the other shifts for want of workers.

Fibre2fashion News Desk - India

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