Special Focus on Skilling and Up-skilling of Farmers in Uttar Pradesh

The Uttar Pradesh Government emphasized on ensuring a special focus on skilling and up-skilling of farmers in the State under the Recognition of Prior Learning Program (RPL) of PMKVY,  Skill India. The Centre has promised to work closely with State and has assured that the proposal will be examined, and appropriate steps will be taken to address the community challenge with regard to skill and enhance their overall productivity.

The Centre and State are also working closely with each other to ensure convergence of all skill development schemes so that there is one common framework for all. Under this endeavour, the two are working on integration of the State Skill portal with the Skill India Portal. The process of integration with State Government was initiated in November 2018 with a detailed workshop conducted for all the States including UPSDM in December 2018. UPSDM initiated the process of API integration on 26th June 2019 which finally completed on 3rd July 2019.

Furthering the push on creating world class infrastructure for skill development in UP, it was jointly decided that the India Institute of Skills (IIS)  in Kanpur will soon be operational. The institute will be opened in partnership with the Institute of Technical Education, Singapore and will have around 10-12 labs and will not only focus on hard skills from manufacturing sector but also on skills related to service sector.

Reassuring support from the Centre to the State,   Minister of Skill Development & Entrepreneurship, Dr. Mahendra Nath Pandey said, “MSDE will work closely with Government of Uttar Pradesh to ensure world class infrastructure for skilling and will ensure the up-skilling and re-skilling of its youth under our programs making them market relevant. This will prepare the youth for the industries that are being set up in the State through Yogi ji’s efforts. It will also address the issue of migration in the State and will eventually drive it towards sustainable development.”

In a strategic meeting between Dr. Pandey, and Shri Yogi Adityanath in Lucknow, a joint decision was made to set-up two Skill Centre of Excellence (CoEs) – one in Greater Noida for Plumbing and one in Varanasi for the Services Sector. The two centres will be international state-of-the-art infrastructure which will be created under joint collaboration between the State and the Centre, where the State will provide the land for setting up the two buildings. The infrastructure and training delivery will be supported by the respective Sector Skill Councils and the industry partners to make it relevant to market demand and trends.

Commenting on the partnership, Adityanath said, “We have been focusing on our clusters in UP for skill development through our One District One Product scheme. Our focus is also towards our farmer community and we will work together with the Central government to up-skill them to today’s time and age enhancing their productivity, leading to better livelihood.”

The meeting had detailed discussions on re-energizing the Industrial Training Institute (ITI) ecosystem in the State and focus on its upgradation and modernization. There are a total of 3,134 ITIs in the State with a seating capacity of 7.58 lakh with close to 5.63 lakh students getting trained in them. Under the joint collaboration of State and Central Government, 1396 ITIs have been upgraded through a public private partnership model. Minister, MSDE has given his directions to speed up the modernization drive and ensure the ITIs meet current defined standards making trainings in them, market relevant.

The two ministers discussed effective measures to improve the skilling initiatives of the MSDE in the State by scaling up the State Component under Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY).Uttar Pradesh is considered been one of the more successful States when it comes to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Skill India Mission’ with more than 11 lakh candidates trained under PMKVY, till date. More than 75 Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Kendras (PMKK) have been established and are operational in Uttar Pradesh. The State is also seeing increasing participation from the industry with organisations like PowerGrid, Simon India Limited, NTPC, IOCL, Balrampur Chini Mills, Hero Motocorp Pvt. Ltd.

Skill India has also supported Ayushman Bharat’s Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY)in the State by enabling an MoU between National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) and National Health Agency (NHA); with the objective of training 20,000 Arogya Mitras under the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana.

Dr. Pandey also shared information around renewed focus on Apprenticeship training for the youth. He spoke about the reforms which have been made during the last Central Apprenticeship Council meeting, rationalizing the stipend for apprentices, enhancing capacity and ensuring more youth get opportunity to engage with industry and earn while they learn.  It was also shared that there will be additional focus on rural skill development through the Jan Sikshan Sansthans (JSS) in the State. There are currently 47 JSS in Uttar Pradesh.

Uttar Pradesh is also sending two contestants from the State as part of the 48 member India contingent who will be representing the country in World Skills International Competition in Kazan in Russia 2019.