Anil Puri
CMD, APS group
Introduction
Skill development is imperative for socioeconomic development of a country. Skill development ecosystem in India encompasses broad policy and structural framework that govern the skill development activities at state and central level. Under Skill India campaign about 20 central ministries/ departments including Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship are involved in the implementation of more than 40 schemes for various skill development programs. The push for a policy-backed skill development initiative is a significant step towards realizing the potential of the workforce by enhancing its employability.
India’s largest skill certification scheme, Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY) was approved on 20 March, 2015 and was subsequently launched on 15 July, 2015, on the occasion of World Youth Skills Day to be implemented by National Skills Development Corporation (NSDC) under the guidance of the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE). With a vision of a ‘Skilled India,’ MSDE was put on mission mode to skill India on a large scale with speed and high standards on the platform of flagship scheme PMKVY to drive towards greater realisation of this vision. Owing to the its successful first year of implementation, the Union Cabinet further approved the scheme for another four years (2016- 2020) to impart skilling to 10 million youth of the country. This was undertaken in the light of the Government’s recent skill gap analysis revelation that more than 12 million youth between 15 years to 29 years of age are expected to enter India’s labour force every year in the next two decades and by 2022, another 109 million skilled workers will be needed in the 24 keys sectors of the economy. At present, only 2.3 percent of India’s workforce has received some formal skill training leading to acquire job specific occupational skills. Govt also took note of the fact that the delivery of skilled manpower declined from 7.58 points in 2005 to 5.75 points in 2014 which put India at 48th position out of 60 countries surveyed in IMD world talent ranking. While all was moving smoothly in the direction, The COVID pandemic dealt a severe blow to the Skill India Mission resulting in further widening of skill gaps to alarming levels thus adversely affecting the economic activity.
Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY)
Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY) is the flagship scheme of the Ministry of Skill Development Entrepreneurship (MSDE). The objective of this Skill Certification Scheme is to enable a large number of Indian youths to take up industry-relevant skill training. The trainings are given in the following sectors such as: agriculture, healthcare, automotive, apparel, BFSI, beauty and wellness, construction, capital goods, food processing, furniture & fittings, green jobs, gems and jewellery, handicrafts & carpets, IT and IT-es, iron and steel, logistics, life science, management, mining, media & entertainment, power, plumbing, retail, tourism and hospitality and telecom.
Stakeholders
The scheme has different stakeholders who are responsible for successful implementation of the entire programme. The key stakeholders are – Ministry of Skill Development & Entrepreneurship (MSDE), National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC), Sector Skills Council (SSC), Training Providers, Assessment Agencies, Assessors, State Government, State Skill Missions, Local Administration, UIDAI, Banks and Individuals. NSDC is the main implementing agency which controls and monitors different programmes to be implemented by the central government. SSCs are assigned to identify the specific job roles for which trainings are to be provided through PMKVY. SSCs also affiliate training collaborate both from government as well as from private sectors to impart training. Since training should be followed by assessment; it is the responsibility of the SSCs to recruit third party agencies to conduct assessment for the training programmes conducted. Once the allocation is done, both state governments as well as private training partners have to mobilize the prospective candidates who are in real need of skill training to meet the requirement of the skilled manpower in industry. At the last, NSDC awards the reward money and the certificates on successful completion of the training programme.
Key Components of PMKVY
The PMKVY scheme has been divided into six components. Every component has its own objectives and set of target audiences. Not all are equally required to be absorbed in each of the schemes. Once, the SSC have identified the job role and various sectors where the skilled manpower is required, there is a need to identify the proper implementation and stages to be followed during the entire plan period. The authorities have divided the schemes into six components: Short Term Training, RPL, Special Project, Kaushal and Rozgar Yojna, Continuous Monitoring, Placement Assistance and Standardizing Monitoring and Communication.
India’s Current Skill Analysis
In 2015 a study assessed the skill capacity of Indian workforce through general education and vocational training level to be extremely low i.e., around 38% of the workforce were not even literate, 25% with below primary or up-to primary level of education and remaining 36% having an education level of middle and higher level leaving rest of only 10% of the workforce which is vocationally trained (with 2% formal and 8% informal training). The current data suggests that only 2 to 2.3% of the workforce in India has undergone formal skill training as compared to 68% in the UK, 75% in Germany, 52% in USA, 80% in Japan and 96% in South Korea. The workforce in India has little or no job skills that make them largely unemployable. It is an alarming signal for India which has the youngest population in the world. There is a lot of scope for India to provide its workforce with appropriate skills. As per the 12th Plan document of the Planning Commission, India’s labour population is not educated enough. The people who completed educational qualification up to secondary level are 85 percent of the labour workforce. Approximately 55 percent have completed education level up to the primary level and a small percentage of 2 to 2.3 percent have undergone a formal vocational training. The initiatives like Make In India, Digital India, start-ups and funding programs laid on Skilled India are steps in the direction. The current skill landscape of India is not very positive.
What is ailing the skilling ecosystem
The government cannot be blamed for a lack of effort, but outcomes remain poor – in far too many cases, both employers and job-seekers are unhappy. The issue is the approach to creation of the skilling ecosystem. A vast majority of skill development programmes are structured in similar manner – the government funds almost the entire training and incidental costs. Students may pay a token amount and the industry pays nothing. Typically, programmes entail just two-three months of classroom training (given limited budgets, governments aims to reach as many youth as possible) and have a minimum-placement clause of around 70% of students trained (since governments need tangible outcomes at the end of training). If placement targets aren’t met, training providers stand to lose money.
Implications
This approach has three implications:
- Short Duration of courses: Given short training duration, and absence of industry exposure, training providers are unable to meaningfully improve the candidate’s skills. Hence employers see very little value-add in training, and essentially view training companies as manpower sourcing agencies. Naturally, they aren’t willing to offer higher pay to a trained candidate versus an untrained one.
- Monetary gain: As students don’t see any immediate monetary gain in spending time or money attending a skills course they do not aspire for such courses or jobs.
- Placement Requirement: given the placement requirement and limited budgets, training companies/ TPs end up focusing more on socalled easier sectors – such as retail, hospitality, domestic business process outsourcing (BPO) etc; and less on critical sectors such as manufacturing and technical services and least in the private security industry.
More fundamentally, the government is placing too much responsibility on itself and training providers and too little on employers and students. It’s like offering a free lunch to employers and students which they don’t even want to have, since it’s uncooked. We need to overhaul the recipe and get employers and students to own up to its preparation. This is the crucial difference between the Indian approach and the one used by the world’s most successful vocational training system – in Germany – in which employers fund the bulk of the programme’s cost through an apprenticeship-based system. The German approach combines classroom instruction with practical training through a paid apprenticeship model. These are usually long-duration (twothree years) courses with a diploma or degree at the end of training, making it aspirational for participants. Lastly, all companies are incentivized or mandatorily asked to participate in the programme – so that even if a trained worker leaves one company for another, the industry as a whole doesn’t lose out. Many states have examined the schemes and polices under National Skill Qualification Framework at school, polytechnic and university level. The most critical challenges for government are to change the mindset of a common man in favour of vocational education and out-dated curriculum. The major challenge faced in the country to implement skill development programme is the perception of people and society towards the skilling. People consider skilling as the last option in the race of their career/ academic system. In 2018, a study assessed the financial spending, quality standards and challenges faced by Punjab Skill Development Mission and found placement as most challenging task in skill imparting and training.
Issues and Challenges in Implementation of PMKVY
The challenges faced in implementation of PMKVY are:
- Affiliation Process a Lengthy and Exhausting Path: All centres of empanelled training partners with the state government are required to undergo centre accreditation and affiliation process. Firstly, Inspection Agency (IA) conducts desktop inspection then physical inspection of TC and share this with Sector Skill Council (SSC). If SSC approves the Accreditation result, TC to apply for Affiliation for accredited job Roles and pay fees (Operation Manual 2016-20). A long list of documentation had to be reviewed and attached in a format shared by SSC and submitted to NSDC portal. Affiliation post so much of CAPEX is even liable to suspension and cancellation if vacancies are not utilized and TC is lying idol for more than specified period.
- Training of Trainers: Trainers training is one of the main elements of skill development framework. And absence or inefficiency of the same would result in severe constraint in the implementation of skill development programmes.
- Mobilization: Student registration for vocational education and training has been a incredibly complex activity. The outlook of person concerned with the advancement of expertise is also very conventional. Skilling has always been branded as a blue-collar job, which is further associated with low pay scales. Besides, local jobs are restricted in nature and students are not willing to leave their hometown. The absence of knowledge of skill development course at block and village level also a big challenge.
- Pay-Out Issues: The training providers/ centres are facing regarding the pay-out’s receivable from the government, all the training providers faced huge problems starting from opening of student bank accounts to receiving pay-outs in a timely manner from the government.
- Placement Challenge: There is huge gap in terms of the expectations and actual employability of youth undergoing training under PMKVY. The industry leaders expressed concerns about the quality of training rendered within a short span of 6-8 weeks.
- Insufficient Scale and Restricted Capability: Scale and capability are inadequate.
Conclusion
Skill development is very crucial and key aspect for the economic development of a country. It needs a coordinated effort from all the Govt agencies, stakeholders, industry partners and the students to make it a successful program. The policies, if are able to reach a larger audience will make a difference in the employment scenario of the country. It is observed that despite spending huge amount on the implementation of PMKVY, government is far away from achieving its target to train 1 crore people. The government needs to create awareness amongst youth with respect to the skill development courses. Certain promotional campaigns spreading the importance of skill development courses, that too, from government is highly required as people have a tendency to take the word of government quite seriously comparative to private training partners. The government may consider issuing some kind of notification to industry for giving priority in recruitment to those candidates who have completed skill training from these skill centres . In 2019, an analysis of the PMKVY under skill India campaign and their impact on reshaping Indian economy found that along with government initiative industry should also come in public-private partnership to improve skill index. While manufacturing and automobile industry have extended their support but PSI has remained dormant on this aspect. PSI & MEPSC also did very less to ensure skilling and reskilling of job roles beyond UASG & Trainer and job roles like CCTV operator, Security Supervisors and Assignment Managers remained untouched. It is high time, PSI be given an independent SSC and not a merged entity with Management (MEPSC) to be fair and just to a large employment generating industry like PSI. Skill gap have a serious impact, not only on the employers, but also on the economy as a whole. One of the major concerns is the loss of productivity and revenues as many of the jobs remain vacant for significant time due to lack of skilled labour. Post pandemic scenario & election mode, Govt needs to revisit this vital aspect to give a push to bridge the wide skill gaps in boosting the Skill India, Digital India and Atmanirbhar Bharat.
