The textile industry in and around Coimbatore, Tirupur, Karur and part of Bengaluru was facing shortage of labour, particularly skilled workers, which at any given time requires three lakh to five lakh workers, a board member of Indian Texpreneurs Federation (ITF) Srihari Balakrishnan said.

He was speaking at a function organized to distribute certificates and appointment orders in ITF member mills trained under Skill Development Programme.

Balakrishnan further said that ITF has organized a job mela where 1,000 trained candidates were given certificates and 170 received appointment orders.

Prabhu Dhamodaran, ITF convenor giving details of the scheme under Prime Minister Kaushal Vikas Yojna, said in the pilot phase the member-mills have skill-trained 18,500 workers and for the second, it has signed an MoU with National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to train and employ 50,000 candidates.

According to Tirupur Exporters’ Association president Raja M Shanmugham the textile industry which has only four percent share in the international market needs to tap the real potential.