Lt. Gen. (Retd.) S.S. Mehta, Principal Adviser, Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), speaking at the plenary session on 'Skilling India: A Window of Opportunity' in Hyderabad on January 9, 2006.

Plenary VIII

Skilling India: A Window of Opportunity

Chair: Dr. J. Geeta Reddy, Minister for Major Industries, Tourism and Sugar, AP

Opening Remarks: S. Krishna Kumar, Secretary, MOIA Presentation: Lt. Gen (Retd.) S.S. Mehta, CII

S. Krishna Kumar, Secretary, MOIA, in his introductory remarks, mentioned the objectives of this plenary session. MOIA was entrusted with the task of administering the Emigration Act. About 10 lakh Indians went overseas for employment every year, he said. While there was certification of skills for professional courses such as medicine, engineering and management, the problem arose in respect of semi-skilled and unskilled workers. Should India continue to be seen as a provider of unskilled /low skilled workers?

"If we take the challenge of repositioning India as a skilled workforce, how do we respond to this challenge?" he asked. This is where the MOIA wished to build partnerships to realise the potential for Indian people. He then requested Dr. J. Geeta Reddy, Minister for Major Industries, Tourism and Sugar, Andhra Pradesh, to conduct the proceedings.

Lt. Gen (Retd.) S.S. Mehta, Principal Adviser, Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), while dwelling on the road map to skilling India, stated that the 21st century belonged to Asia. India was on the strategic radar of developed and developing world.

He mentioned that some of the important advantages India had were:

• Demographic advantage (mean average age of Indian would be 23.7 years in about 10 years from now)
• Indians spoke English
• India had a creditable IT image world over
• Potential surplus population
• Workforce shortages in developed world

However, according to Lt. General Mehta, the reality check pointed out some challenges India would be facing in future:

• Unemployed people would be about 63 million by 2010
• Large-scale rural-urban migration of Indian labour market
• Proportion of vocational training centers very low
• Current dropout rate from schools was also alarmingly high

In future there were plenty of opportunities in India, he said. GoI recently launched a new programme, 'Bharat Nirman', with an outlay of Rs. 1,74,000 crore. Provision of electricity to 1,25,000 villages and safe drinking water to 55,067 villages in India was a great opportunity for skilled workers. Thus India was positioning itself as a land of opportunities both for investment and employment. There was a need to provide skilled workers at the grassroots level. There was a need to benchmark Indian skills with global standards.

Here, the experience and expertise of overseas Indians would be useful in investment and in developing skills of Indian workforce to global standards. Mehta mentioned that MOIA identified CII as partner for providing advice in skill development. He suggested that the interested overseas Indians could interact with CII to chalk out programmes.

Dr. J. Geeta Reddy, in her address, reinforced the point that India was going to have great demographic advantage, and it should seize this advantage and prepare action plans towards this end. India should invest in human capital to make the nation the third largest economic force in the world in the near future. She emphasised the need to establish a 'Knowledge Network' to share the experience and expertise of overseas Indians.