BHEL employees win 3 Vishwakarma National Awards for 2006; Company’s cumulative awards reach the century figure; BHEL Units also bag 3 National Safety Awards

For their innovations, employees of Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) have once again bagged 3 'Vishwakarma Rashtriya Puraskars' for the year 2006, among a host of public and private sector companies in the country. With this, the total number of Vishwakarma awards won by BHEL employees has gone up to a 100 awards.

These Vishwakarma Rashtriya Puraskars have been shared by 8 employees from BHEL’s Haridwar, Bhopal and Trichy units, for innovative suggestions leading to cost reduction, higher productivity, safety and quality of products.

In addition, 3 'National Safety Awards' have been won by BHEL's Electronics Division and Electroporcelains Division, Bangalore for outstanding achievements in terms of the longest accident free period and lowest accident frequency rate at their works.

The awards were presented by Mr. Oscar Fernandes, Union Minister of State for Labour & Employment (Independent Charge) at a function in New Delhi.

Significantly, BHEL and its employees have been winning both these prestigious national awards, instituted by the Government of India, Ministry of Labour, consistently, since their inception.

BHEL has also achieved substantial savings of Rs.1,770 Million during fiscal 2006-07, as a result of the implementation of an Improvement Projects Rewards Scheme (IMPRESS). Aimed at encouraging individuals to take up improvement projects for capability building and for continuous improvement in every sphere of activity, the scheme was introduced company-wide in 2005-06. The scheme is e-network based and provides weightage for various aspects like relevance to the department, innovation/creativity, meeting targets, institutionalization, deployability and financial impact.

During 2006-07, the scheme was given special thrust to harness untapped potential in the organization for achieving higher efficiency in conversion of basic inputs like material and capital into saleable products and services. During the year, about 9,500 improvement projects were registered taking the total number to 23,700 since the introduction of the scheme. Out of these, about 63% of the projects have been completed and implemented. With this, the total savings from the scheme so far have risen to Rs.3,980 Million since its inception.