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Skill India: Connecting Indian youth to global opportunities

Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan chaired the 3rd meeting of the steering committee of National Skill Development Mission (NSDM). In the meeting, discussions centered around skill development schemes, skill gap analysis and skill mapping. A significant point of deliberation was on how the curriculum be developed keeping in mind the emerging trends so that Indian youth can connect with global opportunities.

Various steps are taken to make India’s youth ready for the future. The future expects one to be updated with the skills of emerging times. On 21st April 2022, the Pradhan Mantri National Apprenticeship Mela was launched. Apprenticeship is considered the most sustainable model of skill development, and it has been getting a big boost under Skill India Mission.

The government is aiming to train one million youth per annum through apprenticeship training. The training is conducted every month from June 2022.

Even to sail the boat of unplanned times, over 1.20 lakh candidates were trained under Customised Crash Course programme for COVID warriors.

Roadmap for developing India’s skilled youth:

NSDM was launched by the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) on 15th July 2015. The mission was launched for creating convergence across various sectors and different states in terms of activities relating to skill training.

The objectives of the mission include:

1. Implementing the National Skills Qualifications Framework (NSQF) which will allow opportunities for long-term, as well as short-term training, leading to productive employment and career improvement.

2. Using the NSQF module to maintain a balance between the industry- employer demand.

3. Providing facilities of re-skilling and up-skilling to the workforce of the unorganised sectors of the industry.

4. Ensuring high-quality training standards through high-quality teaching and benchmarked institutions according to national and international standards.

5. Support weaker and disadvantaged sections of society through focused outreach programmes.

6. Enabling pathways for transitioning between the vocational training system and the formal educational system, through a credit transfer system.

7. Maintaining a national database, known as the Labour Market Information System (LMIS), which will act as a portal for matching the demand and supply of skilled workforce in the country.

Government initiatives to promote skill development:

There are various initiatives taken by the government to promote skill development of youth.

1. Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY): It aims to provide free skill training avenues to youths of India. More than 7.36 lakh candidates were trained under PMKVY over the last one year.

2. Skill Saathi Counseling Program: MSDE also launched the Skill Saathi program, aimed to sensitize youth on various avenues of Skill India Mission.

3. Skill Hubs: MSDE informed that 2,28,000 students were enrolled in 1,957 Skill Hubs this year. Skill Hub initiative aims to facilitate and make education more relevant and create industry fit skilled workforce.

4. Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Kendra (PMKK): These are the state-of-the-art model training centres envisaged to create benchmark institutions that demonstrate aspirational value for competency-based skill development training.

5. Skills Strengthening for Industrial Value Enhancement (STRIVE): The main focus of the scheme is to improve the performance of Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs).

6. SANKALP: It is a Centrally Sponsored Scheme which is collaborated with the World Bank and focuses on district-level skilling ecosystem through convergence and coordination.

7. Industrial Training Centres (ITIs): These centres are aimed at expanding and modernizing the existing training ecosystem. Recently, 116 Government Industrial Training Institutes were given approval for running drone courses. A total of 274 Government ITIs were given approval for running a Dual System of Training, DST. Around 10,000 working women and ITI girl students were given training for self-defence.

 

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