We reached Bombay Rayon
Fashion ltd. At 9:50 and we were taken to the admin block.
The General Manager of Human
Resource Mr. Khan told us about the industry’s past and its achievements . He also
told us about division of work force and the benefits provided to the workers
in the industry.
There are 3000 workers in
total and 80% of them are women, 20% are men. This shows the importance given
to women empowerment in the firm. A medical room is available for the workers
and the treatment is free of cost, they have a qualified doctor who is
available through out the working hours and an ambulance is also handy in case
of emergencies. The workers are also provided free transportation. There is a
Child Care Center (crèche) for the workers children who are below 6, so that
their parents can work without any worry.
Mr. Khan aims at retaining
the employees by giving them good compensation for their hard work. The workers
are paid double for performing double time tasks i.e. Rs.1000 and they are
provided with various benefits like Provident Fund (which can be withdrawn
anytime, if necessary). They are paid attendance bonus if they work for the
entire month without any holidays. They don’t have a problem of absenteeism
since they take care of their employees and their needs. “Absenteeism rate is
only 5% in our firm,” said Mr. Khan.
So, that was a glimpse into
the Human Resource Management of the firm.
After that, we were told
about the various sections under production department. A cloth material has to
pass through all these sections to turn into a finished garment.
The sections are-: 1. Fabric
section, 2. Cutting section, 3.CAD, 4. Sampling section, 5.sewing
section(manual and electrical), 6.buttoning section, 7.ironing section,
8.finishing section, 9.packing section and dispatch.
After the induction we split
into 2 groups and headed to see the functioning of the fabric Industry.
FABRIC DEPARTMENT
In this department various
types of cloth materials and designs are kept in display. Many reputed
companies like H&M, GAP come and place their orders over here. Once the
vendor places the order and selects the fabric, it is checked in the inspection
machine and there are various kinds of defects that are looked for. A material
is accepted and taken forward for cutting if it has less than 10% defects, if
not, the material is rejected. After inspection the shrinkage is also tested.
They send the cloth material for washing and the amount of shrinkage is seen
and based on that extra length is added so that the cloth will reach its ideal
size after wash instead of becoming too small.
C.A.D(computer aided design)
After the checking the fabric
moves to the C.A.D where the vendors give samples of the designs they want and
the size ratio(small, large, medium). The workers create digital layouts of the sample design in the computer
to make the cutting process easier. Different parts of the garment are carefully
adjusted according to the size on the fabric to avoid any kind of wastage.
After creating the C.A.D the plotter machine prints out the design. A sample is
made and shown to the vendor and if they agree, the garment moves to the
cutting area.
CUTTING SECTION
The garments are cut using
the CAD printouts as guidance. The various parts of the garment like the
sleeves, collars, cuffs are cut using band knife machines and trolleys are kept
in handy so that it is easier to carry them to the next section. All the pieces
are segregated based on their size and are bundled together. After all the
parts of a garment are cut they are moved to the stitching section.
STITCHING SECTION
In this section all the parts
of the garments are first stitched separately to give them the shape. Various
busy hands work on them. A section of people work on collars, a section of
people work on cuffs and so on. After
the parts are stitched they move on for assembling. One part is attached to
another part by one worker and then automated machines carry it to the other
worker who attaches another part and it continues till the garment is complete .
BUTTONING AND IRONING SECTION
All the garments move to the
buttoning section. After the buttons are sewed in place, the workers manually
iron the garments and they come out looking fresh and crisp.
DUST REMOVING AND METAL DETECTION
After every thing is done the
garments are moved through dust removing machine to remove any kind of dirt and
then it is sent through metal detection machine because if the vendors find any
metal pieces in the clothes they can claim money form the firm. So, they have
to be very careful so as to not leave any kind of metals in the garments.
PACKAGING SECTION
This is the last process in
production. First the sleeves are
folded, then a hard tag is attached to each and every garment , the top side is
dusted again, the size tags are fixed and then labels are checked. Finally the
clothes are folded and put into poly bags. All the poly bags are then placed into
different carton boxes based on their size. That is the end of production
process. After this one sample is sent to the vendor for final checking called
the clock checking. In this process they check if all the parts and all the
tags and labels are present in the garment. Once approved, the goods are
dispatched to their respective companies.
That is how many stages a
single garment has to pass through to reach us. This visit was a very
informative and insightful visit for all of us. We got to learn and see the
various steps involved in the production process and also the the way the workers are managed
and compensated in the firm.
