Uttar Pradesh: human resources and skill development
The State has a reasonably large set up of ITIs/polytechnics and degree colleges imparting education and training in vocational areas but the quantity as well as quality of trainings provided by these institutions is a cause of concern. The total availability of seats in these institutions (approximate annual intake of 3.5 to 4 lakh) is to be seen in the perspective that approximately 20 lakh youth drop out of the formal general education streams between class Vth and XIth and a further 8 to 10 lakh drop out after completing class XIIth. Thus, every year 20 to 25 lakh youth are available to join the labour force provided they are appropriately guided and provided facilities exist to equip them with useful and employable skills. This challenge is to be addressed by launching short duration skill development programmes which are employment oriented and which are designed based on the skill needs of the economy. Several departments of the state aim to contribute to this goal through implementation of various central schemes but, as subsequent discussion would disclose, the achievements are far short of the target.
Vocational and Professional Education for Skill Development in ITIs/Polytechnics and Degree Institutions
Uttar Pradesh has a population of about 20 crore which accounts for one-sixth of India’s population. The State has about 1500 ITI and ITCs which have an annual intake of approximately 1,80,000 students. There are about 330 polytechnics, both government and private, which have an annual intake of approx. 97000 students. In addition, there are approx. 700 degree level institutions, mostly in private sector, with an annual intake of approx. 200,000 in technical courses (engineering and management). Thus, the formal vocational education and training infrastructure provides skilling opportunity to 4 to 4.5 youth in the age group of 18 to 23 years. It may however be noted that the average annual graduation from ITIs, Polytechnics and Degree sectors has been less than 3.0 lakh per year as the capacity of the private institutions has not been fully utilised and as significant capacity in private ITIs and Polytechnics has been added in last 2 years where first batches are yet to graduate.
The key issues that need to be addressed in regard to the formal vocational and training sector are:
- Capacity Utilization of private sector ITIs, Polytechnics and degree colleges has been less than 60% in recent years. This is due to several reasons. First, many of these institutions have been set up recently, so it will take some time for them to get established. Second, the quality of instruction in many private institutions is not satisfactory. Third, the employment scenario in recent years has become bleak. This has seriously impacted the admissions and large number of institutions offering MBA / PGDM and MCA degrees have shut down.
- The Existing capacity demands attention to the quality of trainings given and the kind of employability they can lead to. It is estimated that less than 30% of the graduates from ITIs and Polytechnics are able to get gainful employment after completion of course. It therefore becomes essential that quality issues in terms of curriculum and course structure, infrastructure, teachers and employability prospects be addressed.
- Over a period of time, capacity of the vocational sector institutions needs to be increased to address the skewness and also to provide adequate access to the youngsters. For example, the availability of seats per lakh population in ITIs and ITCs is only 74 as compared to the national average of 110. The same situation pertains to the diploma sector.
Skill Trainings under the Apprenticeship Training Act There are about 20,000 seats available for Apprenticeships in U.P. The Government aims to ensure that the capacity is used to the optimum. There is potential to increase this capacity by engaging with all big industries, factories and company offices in the state. The quality of these trainings shall be a priority and a system shall be put in place to avoid all discrepancies in admissions.
Performance under the Skill Development Initiative (SDI) Scheme in Uttar Pradesh In pursuance of the directions given by the Government of India, Skill Development Mission was launched in October 2008 in the state with Principal Secretary, Vocational Education as Mission Director and Secretaries of Rural Development, Finance, Small Industries etc as members of the Mission Executive body. A task force was also constituted under the chairmanship of the Chief Secretary for brining in convergence amongst the skill development programmes being run by various departments and for monitoring of these programmes.
It was around this time that Skill Development Initiative (SDI) scheme was launched by Directorate General of Training and Employment (DGET), GOI where skill development programmes (more than 1400 programmes notified as Modular Employability Skills (MES) course, each of a duration ranging between 200 to 450 hrs) were to be conducted by public and private institutions registered as Vocational Training Providers (VTPs). These VTPs were registered by DGET in collaboration with the state government and were to be reimbursed at the rate of Rs 15 per hour of training per trainee. Implementation of the SDI scheme was approved by the state cabinet, which also decided that the infrastructure available with state government departments be made available to VTPs for running these courses. More than 1600 VTPs were registered in the state which reportedly trained approximately 240,000 persons over next two years. However, all these VTPs were derecognized by GOI on complaints of fraud and matter relating to payments claimed by more than 450 VTPs amounting to approx. Rs 100 crore is still being resolved.
GOI launched the revamped SDI scheme in August 2010, with the same operational features but with the difference that responsibility for registration of VTPs and payments were devolved to State level Skill development societies. However, the scheme is yet to take off. Although a skill development society was constituted in March 2011 and advertisement was issued for registration of new VTPs in end 2011, so far only 157 VTPs have been registered with only 17 of these being private institutions. As of now only 1500 youth are undergoing training and most of the recently registered VTPs are yet to become fully functional. Some of the main reasons that seem to have contributed to this state of affairs are (a) the disillusionment of private sector providers with the scheme due to pending payment issues (b) absence of a dedicated organization for implementation of the scheme as no staff.
for sanctioned for the society for managing the scheme (c) lack of leadership provided to ITIs who are as it is facing a severe shortage of trainers and (d) lack of district organization for mobilization of youth and for monitoring of the scheme.
kill Development Trainings by various departments under Central Schemes As discussed earlier, the skill development is also encouraged through schemes and funds made available by several central government ministries and departments. Many of these schemes are being implemented in the state but achievements are not very satisfactory as disclosed by the following details:
Urban Department: The Swarna Jayanti Shahari Rozgar Yojana (SJSRY) is being implemented through this department. For the year 2012-13 about 11,700 have been trained out of a total target of 1,25,000 under the Skills Training for Employment Promotion amongst the Urban Poor (STEP-UP) component. The scheme prescribes average cost of per training as Rs 10,000 per capita. About Rs.63 crores are earmarked for the STEP-UP component under SJSRY every year.
Rural Department: The Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY) is soon to be replaced by National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM). At present, the placement linked skill training under NRLM is being implemented directly by the Central government on the basis of the projects submitted by state government. So far 61 projects have been sanctioned and the department is preparing to get 17 more projects approved. These 15 | P a g e projects are not uniformly dispersed across districts and so far placement linked training, 85,562 rural BPL youth have been trained in 2 years against a target of 120,715.
Vocational and Technical Education Skill Development Initiative Scheme-Modular Employable Skills (SDI-MES) currently has about 157 VTPs registered. About 1,500 students have been trained under this scheme in the last year. The State has an allocation of ~ Rs. 100 crores under this scheme. There is a need to increase the number of VTPs registered to optimally utilize the funds available under this scheme. The Department of Technical Education runs the Community Development through Polytechnics scheme under which 27,000 students were trained. It currently has a capacity to train about 36,000 students.