Tata Motors' flagship SUVs made by all-women team in Pune plant

A dedicated team of 1,500 young women are the smiling faces behind the production of Indian automaker Tata Motors' flagship Harrier and Safari SUVs. Mayank Dhingra visited the Pune plant to learn more.

- Mayank Dhingra

The Tata Motors plant in Pimpri, Pune, is a historical automotive location, for it was the birthplace of the company's first passenger vehicle model - the Tata Indica-back in 1998. The facility has undergone a lot of modernisation activities over the years, and today it belts out a range of car models, including the flagship Tata Harrier and Safari SUVs, which are uniquely built by an all-women team at the TCF-2 or trim-chassis-fitment-2 assembly line at this plant.

The Harrier and Safari are based on the company's Omega Arc platform, and therefore, the TCF-2 assembly line is also christened the Omega Factory. Tata Motors has set a new benchmark for diversity in India's four-wheeler manufacturing sector with this state-of-the-art assembly line, where young women from various parts of Maharashtra are the driving force behind assembling the two brute SUVs from scratch.

The company has engaged 1,500 women, between 18 and 25 years old, at this assembly line, which was transitioned to become an all-women assembly shop in February 2022. While the initial onboarding and recruitment process was laden with mega challenges, today, Tata Motors inducts these ladies on its shopfloor under an earn-and-learn (Kaushalya) programme, wherein it reaches out to ITI and high school girl students in the hinterlands of Maharashtra, scrutinises and onboards them to do a company-sponsored three-year Diploma programme, which involves on-the-job training at the shopfloor.

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