Punjab Opens ₹23 Crore Tech Hub Offering 3D Printing and Robotics Training

The 3D printing talent pool in Punjab just got a significant injection. Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann laid the foundation stone on March 31 for the ₹23 crore Captain Amol Kalia Centre of Excellence at ITI Nangal, a government-backed technical facility designed to push 540 students through industry-aligned training covering 3D printing, robotics, electric vehicle technology, drone operation, and solar systems. A course track in civil aviation and air hostess training rounds out the program list, signaling that the facility is targeting employment across multiple emerging sectors simultaneously.

The centre, located in Nangal's Rupnagar district, is named after Captain Amol Kalia, a Kargil war martyr who was from Nangal, and was announced as part of a ₹75 crore development package Mann unveiled for the city. That broader package also includes North India's first glass bridge over Nangal Lake and an ₹18 crore auditorium and academic block at Dr B.R. Ambedkar School of Eminence.

The stat that should command the attention of anyone tracking India's maker ecosystem: Punjab has already expanded ITI seat capacity from 32,000 to over 52,000 in 2025-26, an increase of more than 60 percent in a single year, while introducing more than 800 new industry-oriented courses statewide. The Nangal facility is one of 11 government ITIs upgraded to Centres of Excellence, with ₹22 crore collectively spent on infrastructure and machinery across that group. At ₹23 crore, Nangal's allocation sits above that collective average, reflecting the scale of what is being built here.

For the 3D printing community watching this region, the downstream effects are worth tracking closely. When a government-funded program graduates 540 students with hands-on printing and fabrication skills, those graduates enter the labor market as potential print farm operators, repair technicians, CAD-to-print service providers, and retail staff for consumer-printer sellers. The Centre of Excellence model, especially one backed by ITI infrastructure, tends to produce graduates who stay regional, which means Nangal and surrounding Rupnagar could see measurable growth in local print capacity within 12 to 18 months of the facility's completion.

Over the next 6 to 12 months, watch for a few specific signals. The ₹22 crore already committed to machinery upgrades across Punjab's 11 upgraded ITIs suggests hardware is being sourced now, meaning some of that capacity may come online ahead of the Nangal centre's full opening. Government-backed ITI labs with this kind of infrastructure investment often make supervised machine time available as part of their operating model, which can translate into accessible print time for local small businesses once facilities are fully operational.

Punjab's state government has reserved 5 percent of seats in private ITIs for economically weaker students, a policy that widens the talent pipeline further and adds a socioeconomic dimension to the fabrication workforce being built. A competitive labor pool in fabrication also tends to compress service pricing over time. If the Nangal centre delivers on its 540-student enrollment target, Rupnagar could see its first meaningful cluster of trained print technicians in the consumer-market segment, creating conditions for local service competition that the region currently lacks.

Captain Amol Kalia's name on the building carries its own weight in Nangal, where he is remembered as a hometown hero. That the state chose to attach his legacy to a technology training center rather than a conventional memorial says something deliberate about where Punjab is directing its technical education investment and who it expects to benefit.