Principal of ATDC- Ignou Community College Anjani Kumar Mishra addresses students of JD Women’s College in Patna on Wednesday. Picture by Ashok Sinha

Patna, Jan. 5: The road to the world of fashion is no longer closed to the people of Bihar. ATDC-Ignou Community College organised a workshop — Career opportunities in the fashion and garment export industry — at JD Women’s College today to make people aware about possible career opportunities in the field.

The community college is run under the aegis of the Union ministry of textiles.

Students, who took part in the workshop, were told about career opportunities generated by the central government through their different schemes. The workshop aimed to educate youngsters about the fashion world so that they are able to decide if they want a career in it.

Anjani Kumar Mishra, the principal of ATDC-Ignou Community College, Patna, was the key speaker at the workshop.

He said: “Candidates with degrees in fashion designing courses are always in demand with big garment houses and organisations. This field has a lot of opportunities to offer to the people committed to the sector. An apprentice is also given a good stipend by companies, which later grows into a handsome salary that keeps on increasing as the years go by.”

“Seventy per cent of the manpower in the industry is from Bihar. But because of the lack of opportunities in the state, they have to work at places like Ludhiana, Delhi and other places. There is a need for around 1.5 crore skilled people in the garment export industry by 2015. The central government has taken the initiative to train the people here. One such scheme — Smart — by the textiles ministry aims to enrol people with a minimum qualification of Class V. The trainee would have to pay a minimum amount for the course where they would be provided with all the training material. The scheme is already in operation in states like Tamil Nadu and others. Now, it is time to provide the opportunities to Bihar, where the youths are keen to utilise the possibilities,” said Mishra. He said the course involves information on printing, dyeing, textile sense, export marketing and merchandising.

In this scheme, special emphasis would be given to women and the backward classes. Candidates from backward classes would get 70 per cent of the training free of cost and sometimes completely free of cost. The scheme would also generate engineers through its industrial engineering course.