Srinagar, Jan 15: AEGIS Ltd—one of India’s leading BPO company and part of Essar Group— is all set to start its operations in J&K on February 15.
To begin with the AEGIS will start a BPO centre in Rangreth IT Park here.  “Some people had created a notion that AEGIS is not serious about starting its operations in J&K. But today we are here to assert that we are very serious and determined to start operations in the Valley. We will be fulfilling all the commitments we made before the chief minister Omar Abdullah last year,” Zahoor Malik, state president J&K, Essar Group, told a selected group of journalists today at Rangreth IT Park.
To recall, in February 2009 the company had announced to set up two BPO centres in J&K. Malik cited a couple of reasons for the delay in the launch. He said the building where the AEGIS would be operating was not earlier safe and stable. “The building is a 35-year-old structure. Our engineering team had informed us that the building was not safe and spacious enough to accommodate more than 50 people. So we had first to give it a proper facelift and bring it up to the international standards,” he said.
“Had it been a simple assignment we could have started it in any building. But this was really a challenging one. Besides we had not worked in J&K before. So we faced a lot of challenges,” added Sanjay Mehta, project architect.
 “Another problem we faced was that two of the sheds were handed over to us only in October 2009 due to some court case,” Malik said adding that work was, however, never stopped.
Speaking to Greater Kashmir, Malik said the BPO centre would provide direct employment to 1000 people who would work in call centre, and indirect employment to many others.
“To begin with we shall have 100 employees. All the employees will be from Kashmir only,” he said, adding that the company shall also be providing training youth to enhance their employability.
Faisal Durani, vice-president AEGIS said the recruitment will be started in next 10 days. “In fact we have already recruited some people, like security guards, canteen boys, etc. We are providing jobs only on the basis of skill,” he said, adding that the employees shall also be benefited by related services like transport, cafeteria, office supplies, etc.
Malik said the centre would overall have 500 seats, however initially it would have 230 seats. “Another 270 seats will be created in the next block that is currently under construction,” he said.
AEGIS BPO centre spreads over an area of 22,000 square feet. “The centre is equipped with the latest technology and offers world class facilities in line with other AEGIS centres worldwide,” said Malik.
 “We have received all the equipment; now we have to only install them that will be done in these days,” he said.
Responding to a query on shifting of some reputed companies from the Valley to Jammu, he said, “Had our intensions been such, we would have started first BPO in Jammu itself, but we have chosen Srinagar instead. Some companies may have shifted to Jammu, but this won’t happen in our case.”

Lastupdate on : Fri, 15 Jan 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Fri, 15 Jan 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sat, 16 Jan 2010 00:00:00 IST