The COVID-19 pandemic has forced scores of migrant workers to leave their work place and head to their native lands to be in the safe confines of their homes.
The State witnessed a large-scale influx of workers from the Gulf countries who now face bleak future after losing their livelihood. The government, through AP Non-Resident Telugu Society (APNRTS), plans to help them find suitable jobs.
“We plan technical trade job melas where clients from the Gulf will be invited to interview and assess local candidates for suitable jobs,” said Venkat S. Medapati, president of the society. “Preference will be given to the returning migrants who already have experience of working in the Gulf and those with upgraded skills,” he added.
Speaking to The Hindu, Mr. Venkat said the NRT Society had established Skill Development Centres at Guntur and Rajampet to train ITI, diploma holders, 10+2 pass and graduates as skilled technicians in the trades which were in high demand in the Gulf nations. “We facilitate placements and along with the recruiters, arrange client interviews for the Gulf placements,” he said, adding that so far, 81 % of the 270 candidates trained in industrial electrician course, had found placements while the remaining ones were under process.
Bank loans
The society is also helping the migrants with bank loans besides educating them about the various State and Central schemes that aim at making them self-employed or scaled up skills as per the industry demands, give them training and provide procedural support related to the employment.
Among many other activities like establishment of Vidya Vahini, a career counselling centre for students aspiring to pursue overseas education by helping them in overseas admission process, scholarship programmes, visa processing and pre and post arrival services, the society has started free training in IELTS (International English Language Testing System).
“This programme has evoked good response with an increasing number of students joining the training classes,” said Mr. Venkat, adding: “To make students aware of our initiatives, we have conducted 131 awareness workshops in 80 colleges. We have so far helped 13 students acquire visas and 68 more are in the process. Of them 38 students have received scholarships and representatives of 27 renowned universities have visited the APNRTS office for student programmes.”
Through its Global Placements Program, the society has also placed 52 teachers in District Schools of the USA, in association with Star Tech Group USA (STG), a first of its kind.
IT training
Besides, it also imparts IT and software online training to non-resident Telugus for their better career prospects and facilitates recruitment drives in the IT and ITES companies in the State for freshers and the recent passed outs from colleges and universities contributing towards a talented workforce. “We have also organised online training for NRIs in advanced courses like AWS, Cyber Security, Artificial Intelligence, PMP, Data Science with Machine Learning and Python which were availed by 412 NRTs,” said Mr. Venkat.
