Maruti to hire 500 people for Manesar; starts wage talks

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Maruti Suzuki India on Thursday said it will hire about 500 workers in this fiscal for the second unit at Manesar facility that was operationalised in 2011.

Meanwhile, the company has started wage negotiations for a three-year period with its workers at the Gurgaon facility, while the same for the Manesar plant employees is likely to start within next 2-3 weeks. It is likely to finalise the agreements by the end of May.

"We need more workers at Manesar for the Plant B. We will hire about 500 people for this by the end of this fiscal," Maruti Suzuki India (MSI) Managing Executive Officer (Administration) S.Y. Siddiqui told.

The company now employs around 2,200 people at the two units at the Manesar plant, he added.

Besides the first unit, MSI had announced to invest over Rs 3,625 crore to set up two new plants with 2.5 lakh annual capacities each at the Manesar facility. While the second unit was opened in 2011, the third one is scheduled to be operational in 2012-13.

Siddiqui said the company will hire people of different verticals like technicians, diploma engineer trainees and laterals for the second unit.

In April 2011, Siddiqui had said MSI will hire at least 2,300 people, mainly for the two new plants at Manesar, in the next two years that will expand its workforce to nearly 11,000 employees.

Talking about wage negotiations, he said: "We have started negotiations with the Gurgaon plant's workers. We are hopeful of reaching an agreement by the end of May and it will be implemented with retrospective effect from April this year."

The company will also start negotiations for its Manesar employees within next two weeks, he added.

He, however, declined to share the likely percentage range of hikes that workers will be offered.

"It is very difficult to say at this moment what could be the hike for the workers. Our team is discussing with the workers," Siddiqui said, adding the agreement will be signed for the next three years.

At present, MSI, which is 54.2 per cent owned by Suzuki Motor Corp (SMC), employs a total of 9,148 people as on March 31, 2012.