Giving Compass' Take:

 • Vanya Gupta describes key oversights of India's skilling programs, and offers viable alternatives such as apprenticeship initiatives for young people. 

• How are skilling programs a useful tool for incorporating India's youth into the workforce? 

• Learn more about funding sustainable livelihoods in India. 

India is expected to add seven crore individuals to its labour force by 2023—a 21 percent addition to the existing base of 33 crore. Given this rapidly increasing workforce, creation of employment opportunities and skill development is vital for the Indian economy. This is especially important because India faces a massive skill development gap; only 4.69 percent of India’s current workforce is formally skilled. Cognizant of this, the government has undertaken several measures to meet the challenge.

The launch of the Skill India Mission in 2015 was one such important measure. Under this mission, several skilling initiatives were launched, including flagship schemes such as the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY), to train a large number of youth in industry-relevant skills so they may secure better livelihood opportunities.

While initiatives such as PMKVY have received enormous backing from the government in terms of budgetary and administrative support, they have not delivered on the expected outcomes.

A 2019 analysis by The Quantum Hub (TQH), the organisation where I work, suggests that these outcomes are, in large measure, expected. A closer look at the programme design highlights issues with stakeholder incentives, as well as challenges in implementing the scheme’s provisions.

  • Insufficient incentives for training partners
  • Low implementation capacity due to geographical spread and absence of standardised testing
  • Leakages due to problems in tracking placements in the informal sector

Our analysis and the findings of the Sharda Committee Report both call for a re-examination of the way skilling is currently being imparted in India. Luckily, there is already a scheme called the National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme (NAPS), which may be capable of bridging some of the gaps identified above. Currently, NAPS is a small scheme, with a 2019-2020 budget of only INR 61 crore. This is a meagre sum when compared to PMKVY, which has been allocated INR 12,000 crore for 2016 to 2020.

Read the full article about skilling programs in India by Vanya Gupta at India Development Review.