This document proposes a 3-tier skill development framework to address India's shortage of 1.2 crore jobs per year for the next decade. It involves (1) 6-month skill courses for unemployed graduates run through public-private partnerships, (2) mandatory career counseling and 100-day apprenticeships for secondary students, and (3) extended skill and apprenticeship programs for school dropouts aged 14+. This framework aims to provide industry-relevant skills while reducing costs through private sector involvement. It could help direct workers towards new job markets and improve productivity across the economy. Challenges include gaining political and institutional support, but the document argues these can be addressed through awareness campaigns and leveraging existing IT infrastructure.
2. INDIA NEEDS TO CREATE & FILL 1.2 CRORE JOBS EVERY
YEAR FOR NEXT TEN YEARS
80% of India’s workforce possesses no marketable skills in labour market
53% of workforce is engaged in agriculture sector which contributes only
17.2% to the country’s GDP
Likewise, only 19% of workforce is engaged in manufacturing industry
which should be the engine of job creation
48% of Indian employers face difficulties in filling vacancies
85% of Indian graduates are unemployable in India’s high growth industries
94% of Indian are employed in unorganized sectors
The gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher education, as per the all India
survey on higher education released by MHRD, stands at 18.8%
3. CAUSES OF THE PROBLEM
1. Poor quality of education and lack of focus on skill development at all levels of
school education
2. Social attitudes of seeing children as a potential source of income in financially
weaker sections
3. Inefficiency of higher, professional and vocational courses to impart skills crucial
for concerned job market
4. Outdated Labor laws and predatory environmental regulation regime which
discourage expansion of manufacturing and the jobs that come along with it
5. No real touch among graduates with actual industry/job functioning
6. Conventionalism in selecting career options largely due to poor counseling
culture
REASONS FOR SELECTING THESE CAUSES
High unemployment turning human resource potential of the country into a
liability
Need to improve quality of jobs and engage more and more people in organized
sector to improve living standards of people
Need to drive people in unexplored job markets to ameliorate oversaturation in
agriculture and other unorganized jobs
Need to increase productivity of workforce to expand India’s economy
4. BUILDING A 3-TIER SKILL DEVELOPMENT FRAMEWORK
WITH PRIVATE SECTOR PARTICIPATION
Unemployed college graduates
• 6 months integrated skill development courses by industry
• The programs will run throughout the year on PPP model
• Their updated skill sets will be centrally maintained in a database and would
shared with the industry
Mandatory career counseling and 100 days apprenticeship of students
at senior secondary level spread over Class 11 and 12
• Counseling based on Psychometric tests, performance and interests of• Counseling based on Psychometric tests, performance and interests of
students
• Inviting private sector participation in providing apprenticeship to students
• Private participation will be encouraged by giving tax sops and including the
activity in CSR domain
Developing skill sets of school drop outs (14+ years age)
• Would have an extended sector specific skill development and
apprenticeship program to make them job ready in 6 months
• Will be simultaneously imparted soft skills, language proficiency and basic
computer skills
• Would join school students in Class 11 and 12 in their counseling and
apprenticeship program according to their performance
5. ADVANTAGES OVER EXISTING ALTERNATIVES
MORE
RELEVANT
SKILL SETS
• Existing vocational
courses like ITIs not
updated with markets
demands
• Reduces costs by
INDUSTRY
ADVANTAGE
• Reduces costs by
involving private
players
• Industry gets to design
curriculum and absorb
skilled labour
RIGHT
DIRECTION
• Create awareness for
unconventional &
unexplored job
markets
• Leveraging best
processes available for
counselling at low
costs
6. IMPLEMENTATION
Corporate, academia and industry experts will design these skill imparting and
allied courses to be dispensed at the three levels : school drop outs, senior
secondary students and degree/diploma holders
Developing a pool of quality trainers from NGOs, Corporate and willing volunteers
from academia. Standard mechanism to be followed while recruiting trainers
wherein private players will be involved
Maintaining a central database of skilled candidates to be shared with the
employers across all sectors. More importantly, the database to be linked to theemployers across all sectors. More importantly, the database to be linked to the
AADHAR CARDS of the candidates
Government to create a corpus for the programme depending on the scale of the
implementation of the programme
The programme to be implemented in varying demographic segments depending
on income levels, literacy rates, employment levels etc.
Tax breaks to be given to the participating private players. Moreover, the
investment to be counted as CSR spending
7. IMPACT OF THE SOLUTION
The impact of the programme will be measured by the updated
employment status of the candidate in his/her AADHAR CARD data
By incentivizing private participation with tax and other benefits, the
programme will be a win-win proposition for all the stakeholders. It will
immensely cut cost that otherwise would have been incurred in a
programme of such scale
The value proposition of having an assured employment due to skill sets The value proposition of having an assured employment due to skill sets
developed in the programme will encourage the targeted segments to
participate and benefit from it
It will result in covering the opportunity cost of an unemployed or pseudo
employed workforce for a very limited investment by government and
corporate, thus making the programme a very sustainable framework in
the long run
Checks and balances involved at all stages to evaluate the efficacy of
syllabus design, trainers and programme implementation
Monitoring : Government shall set up a special purpose vehicle under
MoHRD to design and monitor the programmes at all levels
8. CHALLENGES AND MITIGATION FACTORS
Political Challenges: The programme will require an overhaul of the current
educational setup in the country as well as making provisions for inviting
the private sector in the programme
Institutionalizing the programme can lead to technological and political
skepticism
The inability of the current education setup in assuring the students of
attaining a credible skill set might lead to reluctance to joining the
programme by parents
Initially, the programme would incur a considerable investment on part of
the government and the gestation period for the programme would be
long term
The government in tandem with corporate needs to create awareness
about the importance of programme
Because the programme do not tinker with the current educational setup,
it will not be difficult to convince the legislatures in developing the
framework
We can leverage the IT prowess of our country in institutionalizing a
comprehensive technical setup for the programme
9. APPENDIX
Taking Stock A sector wide scan of Higher Education in India – a
report by CII and PwC(Nov 2012)
Economic Survey of India 2012-13
World Bank Report (2012)