SUNDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2010
KLMNO
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RAMA LAKSHMI/THE WASHINGTON POST
In the Chandankyari village in eastern India, Chinese and Indian workers, shown in 2009, construct a $1.7 billion steel factory that employs 1,600 Chinese and 5,000 Indians laborers.
Chineseworkers fuel India’s staggering infrastructure boom
Construction skills seen as valuable to tech-heavy labor force
BY RAMA LAKSHMI IN CHANDANKYARI, INDIA
Perched precariously on scaf-
folding, several Chinese workers showed Indian laborers how to weld the shell of a blast stove at a steel plant construction. Step by step, the Indians absorbed the valuable skills needed to build a large, integrated factory from scratch in record time. “I have worked on building
four new steel plants in the last 10 years in China, and I am here to teach Indianworkers to do the same,” Hulai Xiong, 38, said about the construction site in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand. “In China, we build very fast. Indian workers are slow and sometimes lazy. They are not familiar with modern industrial construction process- es.”
Clad in blue overalls, 1,600
Chinese supervisors, technicians and other laborers work at the 2,000-acre site. The $1.7 billion factory, which also relies on Chinese technology, employs 5,000 Indian workers. Skilled Chinese workers are
helping India expand its infra- structure at a frenetic pace, even as the two Asian giants compete for economic dominance. Their presence in a nation of
more than a billion people with staggering unemployment may appear incongruent. But the gov- ernment says Indian workers lack the technical skilled needed to transform the country into a 21st-century economic power- house. Until the gap is bridged, com-
panies are relying on the exper- tise of Chinese workers to build mega infrastructure projects. Chinese workers have worked on ports, highways, power and steel plants in India. Chinese equip- ment and expertise have also been used in a crude oil refinery, a cable-supported bridge, the telecommunication networks and even the glass facade of the new airport terminal in New Delhi. “Indiamay be an IT superpow-
er and producing thousands of doctors, lawyers andMBAs every year. But the biggest gap is in the availability of skilled electri- cians, carpenters, welders, me- chanics and masons who can build mega infrastructure proj- ects,” said Raghav Gupta, presi- dent atTechnopak, a consultancy
that released a report on skill development last year. “Most of these workers have to be trained on the job. And that often delays the projects and makes it more expensive.” As the center of economic
gravity shifts fromtheAtlantic to the Indian Ocean, analysts say, the world’s two fastest growing economies will transfer even more technology and skills.
Fears of displacement The Chinese workers in labor-
surplus India prompted an out- cry last year, and India clamped down bymaking visa rules strict- er. About 25,000 workers had to leave dozens of projects midway and return to China because they were on business visas and not worker visas. Construction at 14 power plants was affected. “We have no problems if . . .
Chinese workers skilled in spe- cialized functions come to India. We just don’t want them to displace Indianworkers by doing the jobs that Indians can do,” said G. K. Pillai, India’s home secretary, who said there are a little over 15,000 Chinese labor- ers in India now. Diplomatic relations between
the two nations,who have fought a war and have lingering territo- rial disputes, have remained tes-
“The hare and the tortoise are learning to work together.”
—R.S. Singh, plant director
ty. In recent years, Indian offi- cials have expressed concerns about China’s close ties with Pakistan, India’s arch rival. “We also do not want the
Chinese in projects that are stra- tegically sensitive or near our border areas,” Pillai said, echoing these concerns. Industry analysts say India’s
demand for steel is growing exponentially, and steel produc- tion, now at 70 million tons a year,will need to grow12 percent every year to keep up. The Chan- dankyari plant will begin opera- tions in June 2011 and is expect- ed to produce 3 million tons a year. “China is the only country in
the world that has built so many new steel plants in the past decade, almost like assembly- line products, adding about 80 million tons of steel capacity each year. So we decided to get their
technology and manpower,” said R.S. Singh, director of Elec- trosteel Steel Ltd., the company building the factory in Chan- dankyari. “This factory is a classroomfor
Indian workers and we will cre- ate a benchmark for speed, quali- ty and cost,” Singh said. The Indian workers earn
slightly less than the Chinese, whose speed ultimately brings down the cost of the project, Singh said. The steel plant is expected to take 18 months, a rare feat in India. A government report lastmonth said thatmore than half of 600 large infrastruc- ture projects are delayed, result- ing in 68 percent cost overruns. “If I had just used Indian
workers, itwould have taken five years to construct,” Singh said. “Can India afford the delay?”
New kind of teamwork Before the Chandankyari steel
plant hired him to weld, Babu- jaan Ansari made wooden furni- ture in his village. “The Chinese make us work
very hard, and we cannot speak their language,” said Ansari, 27. “We relymostly on gestures.” The Chinese workers have
learned a fewHindi phrases such as “dowork,” “let’s go” and “I love you.” The Chinese live in a row of
air-conditioned pre-fab rooms and have Chinese cooks. Some say they find the Indian heat unbearable; others complain that the Internet speed is too slow for streaming Chinesemov- ies. Sometimes, they go into the villages for an under-the-tree haircut or for the locally brewed toddy. On their way back to their
rooms after a hard day’s work, many Chinese workers lined up at tiny shops to buy sachets of flavored betelnut powder, which has a mildly intoxicating effect and is popular here. The Indian workers are learn-
ing a new work ethic from the Chinese and are nowmore punc- tual, not stopping work to take frequent tea-breaks or gossip, managers said. There are subtle politically-
tinged changes, too. “The Chinese do not like it
when Indian workers ask too many questions or argue,” said Singh, the plant director. “But after working together, the Chi- nese are now learning to answer some of the questions, and the Indian are learning to ask fewer questions. The hare and the tortoise are learning to work together.”
lakshmir@washpost.com
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