Comments
With the diamond industry planning to move out of Zaveri Bazar after the recent bomb blast, the diamond certification agency International Gemological Institute (IGI) has proposed to follow suit by shifting to Bandra-Kurla Complex (BKC).
Mr Roland Lorie, Chief Executive Officer, IGI, said the institute has already purchased an office in the Bharat Diamond Bourse and would shift after half the industry moves out of Zaveri Bazar.
“Being closer to the trade always helps as nobody wants to send their precious wares to longer distances for testing. BKC is an idle location for the trade. We expect to relocate by end of this year,” he added.
The Antwerp-headquartered IGI is also exploring the possibility of opening new testing labs in tier-II and tier-III such as Chandigarh and Ludhiana due to the growing demand for diamond jewelleries in these centres. At present, IGI has nine testing labs spread across in India.
IGI on an average certifies 10 lakh diamond jewellery pieces a year in India, besides 300,000 loose diamond pieces. It charges a flat fee of Rs 2,800 per certification.
“The importance of certification in the Indian diamond industry has grown many fold of late with awareness among customers to buy quality jewellery,” said Mr Lorie.
Though IGI certifies many branded jewellery it has stayed away from associating with any particular company to maintain customers' trust on it as an independent certifier.
EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMME
Testing labs apart, IGI also conducts specialised courses on diamond grading and jewellery designing in Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Surat and Ahmedabad. The basic one-week diamond certification course costs Rs 25,000 with the six-week graduation in Gemology costing Rs 6 lakh.
Though the institute does not guarantee a job, Mr Lorie said most of the students who pass out are hired by leading jewellery companies as there is a huge shortage of talent in this field. It educates 15,000 students a year.
The institute also conducts similar education programmes in China, Dubai, Belgium and New York. It follows a similar course material across countries with an exception on jewellery designing as it has to be modified according to local preferences, said Mr Lorie.
IGI in association with jewellers conducts short sessions ‘Know Your Diamond' for consumers, particularly in Chennai and Bangalore to spread awareness among consumers on quality diamonds.
Comments
COMMENT NOW
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.