Machine tool sector to face manpower crunch

Bangalore, Jan 4: The Machine tool industry in the country will face a serious manpower crunch in the near future, considering the impressive growth strides it is mapping, according to the Indian Machine Tool Manufacturers Association (IMTMA).

Already losing fresh engineers to the growing IT sector over the last few years, the machine tool industry was even losing those with five to ten years experience as they were weaned away by the emerging sector. Fresh talent was grabbed at the university level itself, IMTMA President C P Rangachar told reporters here today.

He said the industry could not offer the handsome salaries paid by the IT sector. The salary difference could be as high as 100 per cent.

Concurring with him was past IMTMA President and Association Media Chairman Shailesh Sheth, who said the capital investment oriented industry could not offer comparable salaries with the IT sector.

Compared to the IT sector, the manpower in machine tool or manufacturing sector have a major role to play and would have an interesting profession on hand. It was not necessary that in view of automation, machine tools need not go in for skilled manpower. For handling machines that perform multi-skills, a knowledgeable worker was needed to match and handle them, he said.

Currently, the industry might not face any crunch, but in the near future it would definitely be starved of talented manpower, he added.

UNI