Gauri Chabbra
Are you awestruck by the latest fads in dress and couture? Do you dream of being able to customize your dresses to the extent of being you and not just a ‘me too’ product?
Do you ever wonder at bringing about a marriage between science and art?
If you always tend to wander along these lines of thought, here is a perfect career option you can craft for yourself. A career that weaves magic through moods of fashion and serenity of science- Textile Engineering a rich blend of science and art.
Every day the glossy and colourful newspaper supplements and fashion magazines cry hoarse that fashion is big business and the textile trade is booming. People are increasingly been known by what they wear. However,here is a lot more to textile technology than fashion-haute or otherwise. The industry is peopled by many kinds of professionals, with many kinds of skills. The fashion designer is of course the most visible, as are the models who display a designer’s products. But behind the designer, whose main tools are pen, paper, fabric and occasionally some computer software, is a large, multi -layered career…Textile Engineering.
Curriculum and pedagogy:
Textile engineering courses bring about an amalgam of scientific and engineering principles to the design and control of all aspects of fiber, textile, and apparel processes, products, and machinery. These include a wide array of material from natural and man-made materials, interaction of materials with machines, safety and health, energy conservation, and waste and pollution control. Besides, it also exposes you to plant design and layout, machine and wet process design and improvement, and designing and creating textile products.
It includes subjects like:
Textile chemical technology dealing with the innovative solutions to today and tomorrow’s textile wet processing opportunities.
Fiber science technologydealing with fiber and polymer research, developing new fibers, and increasing the productive capacity.
Technical textiles that are manufactured for non-aesthetic purposes, where function is the primary criterion. These include textile structures for automotive applications, medical textiles, protective clothing e.g. against heat and radiation for fire fighter clothing, against molten metals for welders, stab protection and bulletproof vests,spacesuits and the like.
Information Systems Designdealing with use of computers for design of textiles.
Courses in accounting, economics, management, marketing and computers are coordinated with textile courses related to managing people and processes in the fiber, textile, and carpet and apparel industries. Optional courses allow you to concentrate on specific aspects of the business such as marketing or apparel manufacturing. Getting in:
For a diploma in Textile engineering, you must clear the 10th Std. with at least 50% marks. Various polytechnics offer diploma in various disciplines of engineering.
You can pursue a degree of B.Tech or B.E in chemical or textile engineering.
To be eligible for bachelor’s degree course i.e. B.E you must clear the 12th std. Board exam with at least 50% marks(60% for IITs) in the science stream with Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics as compulsory subjects. Several states and IITs have an entrance exam for admission into engineering, colleges in other states grant admission based on marks scored in 12th Std. exam, particularly in the subjects of Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics. Diploma holders can also get a lateral entry into second year of engineering in the same stream.After graduating you can go in for postgraduate studies, M.E or M.Tech.
Further studies up to Ph.D. level are also an option for anyone interested in Research or Academics.
Skill Set:
For textile engineering you need to have a flair for clothes, colors and the ability to play with new themes and fads. Creativity and out of the box thinking is key. You should have the knack to figure things out and find out how things are made. It is this mentality that helps propels you through your college classes.
Besides, you must have problem solving ability and the orientation to view things from all perspectives. A textile engineering education teaches you how to think through a problem in order to solve it. These mental agility skills will help you solve problems for the rest of your life. The fascinating aspect about problem solving in engineering is that there is almost never a single right answer. You access several different approaches to solve a problem, and then it is up to you to show everyone how your solution meets the needs of the design.
Institute Scape:
Some of the colleges offering B. E in textile engineering are:
*Calcutta University College of Textile Tech, W. Bengal
*UP Textile Technology Institute
*Punjab Technical University.
*Government SKSJ Technological Institute, Bangalore
*Jawaharlal Nehru Government Engineering College, Mandi
*Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi
*College of Textile Technology, Murshidabad
“Government Central Textile Institute Kanpur offering B.Textile Technology, Chemistry and M.Tech
*Zial Singh College of Engineering & Technology, Bathinda
*Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Regional Engg. College Jalandhar
*Technological Institute of Textiles, Bhiwani, Haryana
*MLV Textile Institute, Bhilwara offering B. Textile Chemistry and Technology
*M.S. University, Department of Technology and Engineering Baroda
*South Gujarat University, college of Engineering & Technology, Surat.
Career Pathways:
Textile Industry provides a broad spectrum of career pathways. You can craft your career in departments of textile plants and companies varying from small to big scale, i.e., production, planning, quality control, sales or marketing or in agencies of domestic or foreign companies for textile products and textile machinery, concentrated in different regions of the country.
In India, there are two major textile sectors- handloom sector that is an unorganized one and the mechanized sector that is considered to be an organized sector. These both have full growth potential. There are thousands of textiles mills all over the country.
Graduates with textile chemistry find careers in three different areas – research, design and development; production and quality control; and customer service and sales. The profiles can be dyeing and finishing, technical services, research and development, quality control, product development, polymer science and environmental control. Most graduates of the with textile management program initially enter management trainee programs which can ultimately lead to plant or corporate management. Other career options include technical sales, industrial engineering, product development, marketing, customer relations, human resources, and cost and inventory control. So you can work as Process engineer, Quality control supervisor Technical Sales Manager,Operations Trainee ,Process Improvement Engineer and Medical Textiles Engineer .
Students are drawn by the strong job placement, the high salaries and the flexibility the textile degree offers.
“You can do just about anything with textiles,” is what students have to say.
The Road Ahead:
Textile industry is currently poised at a very comfortable position offering opportunities for engineering graduates with skills in quality control, marketing, apparel, computers, management, chemistry, design and engineering. With the foray of many big players in the textile and apparel industry not only in India, but in global playfield as well, employment opportunities have increased manifold.
In the last decade or so, the industry has witnessed an exponential growth trajectory and is also expected to become the second largest employment generator in the times to come…
If you’re interested in having an exciting career in a financially rewarding area,this is it.
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