Bengaluru baker Smriti Nambiar wins silver at WorldSkills competition in Shanghai

Smriti Nambiar speaks about her journey from Bengaluru and Delhi, to China

Updated - October 09, 2026 08:52 pm IST

Indian baker Smriti Nambiar at WorldSkills competition in Shanghai | Photo Credit: Special arrangement

Bengaluru-based baker Smriti Nambiar won a silver at the 48th WorldSkills Competition held in Shanghai recently. Conducted between September 22 and 27, it is one of the biggest international competitions for vocational and technical skills. Five other women represented India across five significant hospitality categories.

Along with the silver medal, Smriti has also been recognised as India’s ‘Best of the Nation’ competitor. This places her achievement high on the global stage and strongly represents her skills within and outside India. WorldSkills brought together 68 countries and regions across 64 skills in six distinct sectors. In the bakery category, 22 competitors participated from across the globe.

Smriti at the competition

Smriti grew up in Bengaluru and did her schooling in Sarjapur, graduating in Hotel Management from IHM Pusa, New Delhi. She says, “I was always passionate about pastries and baking, and wanted to work in that field. Even though I didn’t know much about it while applying, through this competition, I learnt a lot about baking and was able to carry my skills forward.”

Talking about the competition, she says, “The event was organised on a massive scale. Everything from crowd management to time efficiency was perfect. For the bakery section, we were provided with everything from equipment to ingredients.”

(Left) Avin Thaliath who mentored Smriti | Photo Credit: Special arrangement

Her mentor Avin Thaliath, co-founder of the Lavonne Academy, played a vital role in her training. He says, “Smriti’s silver at WorldSkills Shanghai 2026 is a landmark achievement for her and a proud moment for Indian baking. As her mentor and coach, my role was to help her develop the technical discipline, precision and confidence needed to compete at the highest level, but it was her perseverance, composure and relentless pursuit of excellence that ultimately brought her to the podium.”

Smriti trained for two years, but says the most rigorous period was the last four months before the competition. “They give us a module list of breads, and we had to practice how to prepare them. We had to create 16 modules across two days which included pain au chocolat croissant, cinnamon rolls, cream buns, baguette and two types of sourdough.”

For the final round, they had to prepare a showpiece product based on a theme prescribed by the organisers; this time it was Year of the Horse.

“On Day One, I had an hour to assemble the pieces to bake overnight, the final piece is prepared once all the baked segments are ready.” It took her around two hours to assemble her showpiece on the second day.

“In WorldSkills, there is a practice of exchanging badges with everyone. You can exchange a badge from your country with someone else and I ended up collecting a lot of them,” she smiles. For Smriti, this was also a chance to gain international exposure and learn from people around the world. “Now I can say that I know people from different parts of the world, which is something I could not say before.”

The 48th Edition of WorldSkills 2026 was held in Shanghai from September 22-27, 2026

Published - October 09, 2026 08:37 pm IST

food / Bengaluru / Karnataka / The Hindu MetroPlus

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