Of late lot of discussion is going on about the current state of affairs of the ambitious skill development efforts in India. Few things are very clear and denying them would be a sad reflection of our intelligence.
Firstly there was a major goof-up in arriving at the magical almost mythical figure of 500 million youth to be trained. No one is sure how this figure came to be bandied about. With almost no detailing this number became the headline tool for UPA as well as the present regime.
Secondly rather than critically examining what is ailing the pathetic state of the vocational skills eco-system new systems were being built. This was akin to building a penthouse over a rickety base and foundation.
Thirdly government had multiple agencies managing the skills training resulting in turf wars about each one's role and authority. Lots of duplication and over-training of the students was the unfortunate order of the day.
Fourthly unrealistic expectations were built in about the placement options in front of the students. The almost illiterate student was expecting a fancy job after barely 30 days of training. Attrition was almost a predictable fallout.
Among all the government agencies it was largely the Ministry of Rural Development that did some noteworthy work in this area. I would credit this largely to the leadership of Mr. Jairam Ramesh and a few very enlightened bureaucrats, noteworthy among them Mr T. Vijay Kumar. However, the ministry failed to disburse the second and final installment on time which resulted in many serious implementation agencies going out of business.
The National Skill Development Corporation majorly misunderstood its role and quickly morphed into a soft lending agency. It almost became an extension of FICCI and CII put together.
One of the major issues in skill development is the accurate tracking of the youth who have undergone the training. I can state for sure that no agency has yet found a foolproof method of tracking and a lot of fudging has happened in the reporting.
While all this was going on the private sector- the ultimate beneficiary of all these outcome-based interventions, was blissfully silent and non-participative. The worst was that it subsidized its training cost through government funding. it was almost as if it had nothing to do with the skill building.
I know for sure that every year at the Skills Summit various overseas delegations come with a lot of hope to share their expertise. But these summits became routine ones with the same platitudes without anything concrete emerging. No wonder the experts lose interest soon.
What essentially was needed was a different role to be played by the government. Rather than "managing" the skill efforts it should have played a horticulturist role. When a rose garden needs to be tended the gardener ensures the right sunlight, the right quantity of fertilizers, the right quantity of water and as a result the flower blooms. But here the government tried to control the blooming and that has been a major failure. The government needs to play a facilitation role rather than a controlling role.
