Government is pouring crores of taxpayer money into skill development programmes. But can committees and bureaucratic talk shops match skills to jobs?
If you plan to seek an exciting career in ‘rag chopping’ with the paper industry, the government has plans to sharpen your skills. After 60 hours of training and paying a princely sum of Rs 500 for a test, you get a certificate to hang on your wall. Or you could try becoming a ‘cow boy’ (with 80 hours of skill-building) or an ‘egg selling assistant’ (100 hours).
These are random picks from a raft of 1,436 courses that the government thinks will be needed as the Indian economy powers ahead. After expending its first term in office presiding over jobless growth, the UPA is now in overdrive on a skill-building mission without asking itself a basic question: Where will the jobs come from even if talented rag-choppers and egg selling assistants emerge from the woodwork of these modules of the Skill Development Initiative?
All these ideas are end-products of a National Skill Development Policy (NSDP) articulated in 2009 and the subject is priority for the UPA because it believes it has political potential as well as beneficial effects on economic growth.
Early results are underwhelming: Central government entities could collectively train only 45 lakh people in the past year despite spending crores (100 crores make a billion). The prime minister’s advisor on skill development S Ramadorai had admitted in a media interview in March that this year’s target would also not be met.
The human resource development (HRD) ministry said the NSDA would only add “another layer without adding any value”.
(This story appears in the 12 July, 2013 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)