The Critical Need for Structured Upskilling Initiatives for Women in Manufacturing

In India, the public discourse around increasing women workforce is often framed as inclusion. In reality, it is an economic imperative. Because when one part of the population remains underrepresented in critical sectors, the cost is not social alone; it is structural and economic.

In sectors such as steel and stainless steel, representation within factory gates is still largely concentrated in corporate or administrative roles rather than core production jobs.

Roles such as fitters, welders, crane operators, assembly line technicians, and machine operators continue to be largely reserved for the male workforce. Step outside the factory gates, into the larger industrial ecosystem, and this number drops even further. Across fabrication units and heavy industry operations, women’s participation remains extremely limited.

A 2025 empirical study on India’s formal manufacturing sector also showed that just a 1% increase in gender diversity leads to a 2.9% rise in labour productivity and a 2.7% increase in total factor productivity. The research further revealed that industries with gender-diverse workforces achieve 5.8-9.1% higher productivity levels.

Perception Must Change

The manufacturing sector has evolved significantly over the years — not only in scale, but also in the way work is performed. Processes today are more sophisticated, with greater integration of technology, automation, and structured safety frameworks.

In such an environment, the integration of more women into shop floor roles should no longer be seen as far-fetched. With the right intent and institutional support, many of the traditional barriers can be overcome.

We have already seen examples that challenge long-standing stereotypes. Women like Ms Minu Mohanta and Laxmi Murmu, crane operators at Jindal Stainless’ Jajpur facility, are skillfully performing roles traditionally attributed to men. The lesson is simple: capability was never the constraint. Exposure and structured skilling were.

The Real Barrier is Preparation

India has built a strong national framework for skill development. However, we must go further. The future of work will be increasingly skill-driven, and the more employable skills an individual possesses, the higher her chances of achieving economic independence.

If such skill-based certifications are made more accessible and meaningfully subsidised, especially in manufacturing trades, the impact on employment outcomes could be transformative.

Beyond enabling employment and financial independence, this shift is also critical for the industry itself. At a time when manufacturing processes are evolving rapidly, the only way to build a resilient workforce is through continuous upskilling aligned with the changing needs of the sector.

Beyond the Factory Floor, the Opportunity is Even Larger

In the stainless steel industry, significant value addition happens downstream, in fabrication, infrastructure components, rail, metro projects, and architectural applications. Yet female participation in fabrication units remains abysmally low.

India has already demonstrated how targeted skilling ecosystems can unlock participation. Sectors such as tailoring, handicrafts, and food processing lead by example. A similar approach in fabrication and industrial trades could open up meaningful opportunities for women while strengthening the broader manufacturing ecosystem.

Creating focused training clusters for female fabricators can equip women with the skills needed to manufacture stainless steel products and maintain them, from gates, railings, window frames, dairy processing units, and other small infrastructure components.

Such initiatives do more than create job opportunities; they empower women to become micro-entrepreneurs. When women are enabled to take ownership of end production, especially the ones that need design acumen, the opportunities are endless.

Corporate India Also Has a Responsibility

Representation will not change unless organisations deliberately invest in upskilling women and driving their presence in decision-making roles. When women see role models, participation normalises. Just as women in aviation, defense, and sports were once considered unusual, until they weren’t. Visibility changes perception, and the hope is to see that change in manufacturing by a strong margin.

The conversation must move beyond inclusion targets to structured capability creation, both within the organisation and across the broader ecosystem.

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For the broader ecosystem, the government and industry must work hand-in-hand towards making certified skills more accessible and driving focused training in core industrial trades, while internally, organisations must focus on nurturing women role models on shop floors and aligning CSR investments toward manufacturing-linked entrepreneurship.

Through my work with the Stainless Academy initiative, it gives me immense pride to integrate capability building for the stainless steel category among young women in engineering institutions, industrial training institutes and polytechnics across India. These women are the future of the workforce, industry, and India.

And similarly, the absence of women in the fabricator community reminds me of the vast opportunity. My dream is to create cohorts of fabrication service providers owned and operated by women. With precision training in fabrication, welding, machine operations, and downstream value addition, women can transition into higher productivity functions that directly strengthen industrial output.

The effort is not about replacing men in these sectors; it is about expanding the talent pool, improving process discipline, and unlocking untapped economic capacity. When skill development becomes deliberate, measurable, and industry-aligned, women’s participation in manufacturing will stop being an aspiration and become an engine of sustained industrial growth.

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