Mission to tackle skill gaps, empower youth in works

New Delhi: The ministry of skills development and entrepreneurship is firming up a Yogya Bharat Mission, that will develop and oversee the nationwide implementation of basic employability and entrepreneurship skills, a move aimed at harnessing India’s demographic opportunity and preparing a skilled workforce as part of government’s vision for a Viksit Bharat by 2047.

Besides, it also plans introduce a National Employability and Entrepreneurship Measure to regularly track workforce employability data and use it from time to time to make necessary policy interventions, a senior government official, aware of the deliberations, told ET.

“The broad contours of the mission are being worked upon and the ministry will seek Cabinet approval before rolling it out,” the official said.

The ministry is exploring the possibility of introducing entrepreneurship models such as ‘business-in-a-box’, aimed at providing structured, ready to deploy business models for direct implementation by individuals and nano-entrepreneurs with focus on technical skills and mentorship. “This will help to cater to local economies and promote sustainable non-farm employment, particularly in rural, peri-urban and underserved areas,” the official added.

The idea of promoting entrepreneurial skills and providing a necessary environment to nano entrepreneurs is to also prevent large-scale migration for work opportunity which creates pressure on urban centres while impacting growth and development of rural and semi-urban areas.

The government is of the view that India’s demographic opportunity though inspiring but is not automatic. “There is a consensus that it needs to be harnessed through timely policy interventions and strategic measures that are aligned to industry and workforce needs,” the official added. The ministry may collaborate with the ministry of statistics and programme implementation (MoSPI) to develop an index or employability measure that will help it track the impact of its skilling initiatives on the ground. According to MSDE, only 4.1% of India’s youth is formally trained while 30.6% are informally trained through hereditary exposure, self-learning and on-the-job training. The ministry has identified competencies like effective communication, digital and financial literacy, problem-solving, adaptability, and an entrepreneurial mindset as basic employability and entrepreneurial skills that need to be cultivated for building a skilled India.

The plan is to adopt the ‘whole of government approach’ to ensure these skills start from school and continue through higher education and skilling programmes and to address competency gaps.