Bharti's subsi to train potential retailers in India

New Delhi, May 7: Bharti Resources, a learning and development solutions subsidiary of Bharti Group, today tied-up with Global Retail School (GRS) to groom graduates and undergraduates in retail management and other sectors.

Under the alliance, GRS will implement the admission procedure while Bharti Resources will give technical support and develop the content.

''The first right of refusal for recruiting the students will be with Bharti Resources and only those not retained by it can seek jobs in the retail sector with the assistance of GRS's Placement Cell,'' Bharti Resources CEO and Executive Director Sanjeev Duggal told reporters here.

The company aims to set up 100 centres known as 'Bharti Resource Learning Centres (BRLCs)' by next year across all major cities in India with 30 of them to be launched by the end of this month.

''We are looking at 15,000 students in the first year of operations. We want to close the year with about 60 centers to cater to youth interested in telecom, IT and financial services, besides retail'' GRS Managing Director Priyanka Khosla said.

With the largest retailer Wal-Mart set to cash in on the 300-billion-dollar Indian retail market, there will be a huge demand for skilled manpower professionals.

The retail sector will offer over 2.5 lakh jobs in the next two years, with 75 per cent of them being customer-facing jobs.

On a poser whether Bharti Resources will serve its parent company's retail arm -- Bharti Retail -- or its wholesale venture with Wal-Mart, Mr Duggal said it would be one of its customer for the training company.

The BLRCs will offer one-year diploma programme in Retail Management affiliated with the Annamalai University at a fee of Rs 50,000. The GRS-Bharti tie-up will also provide 3-month and 6-month certificate courses for Rs 30,000 and Rs 15,000 respectively in Retail Sales and Marketing, Retail Visual Merchandising and Space Planning, Retail Supply Chain Management, for creating frontend manpower professionals.

GRS is a fully owned unit of Cosmo Aviation Training School (P) Ltd under the brand name Flying Cats, promoted by Ms Khosla.

UNI