National Conference on Skill Building Through Public Private Partnership
October 5-6, 2007, New Delhi

Inaugural Address by Mr. Oscar Fernandes, Hon'ble Minister of State (IC) Labour & Employment, Government of India

Respected Member, Planning Commission, Prof. Mungekar, Secretary, Labour & Employment, Smt. Sudha Pillai, past President FICCI, Shri Onkar Kanwar, Additional Secretary, Labour & Employment, Shri S. Krishnan, Secretary General FICCI, Dr. Amit Mitra, DGE&T Shri Sharda Prasad, distinguished representatives of State Governments and Central Ministries and electronic media, ladies and gentlemen.

It gives me great pleasure to be here with you on the occasion of this important "National Conference on Skill Building through Public Private Partnership" organized jointly by Directorate General of Employment and Training and FICCI in true public private partnership spirit.

Friends, skill development and employment are the core concerns for the Governments worldwide and India is no exception. As per 2001 census, about 54% of our population is under the age of 25 years. uppermost in the minds of these young persons are education, acquiring marketable skills and getting decent jobs and if they do not get these, their energy may get channelized to activities which can pose a serious threat to the peace and tranquility of the nation. It, is, therefore, of utmost importance that the Governments take all steps to bring skill development and employment generation to the centre of governace agenda. Government of India has already brought into focus skill development and employment generation as the core policy imperatives. I would like to urge upon the State Governments to bring skill development and employment generation to the centre of governance agenda as well. They must come forward to participate in the initiatives of the Central Government with regard to skill development in proactive and meaningful manner by providing matching resources, posting effective officers to carry forward the task in efficient manner and working with members of industry in a constructive manner.

As per report of the 61st Round of National Sample Survey Organization, about 12.8 million persons join the labour force every year. However, our training capacity is limited to about 2.5 million per annum. In order to address this challenge, the Prime Minister in his address to the Nation on Independence Day this year announced that we will set up 1500 more ITIs, 100 more polytechnics, 10,000 more vocational education schools and 50,000 ICT based Skill Development Centres in order to train about 10 million additional persons every year. The task is very challenging but not impossible. We are required to do four times more in next five years than what we accomplished in the last 50 years. But there is no alternative. We have to do it. But this task cannot be accomplished by the Government alone. It is here, I would like to invite the captains of industry to join hands with the Governments - both at the central as well as State levels to skill 10 million more persons every year in the next five years. I would like indulgence of industry in two ways: First, to improve the quality of training of existing institutions so that the graduates from these institutions fulfill the needs of the industry. We have already started upgradation of our existing ITIs - 100 with the help of domestic funding and 400 with the help of World Bank assistance and in the upgradation of these 500 ITIs we have involved industry as our equal partners. The experience of the last two years has been very encouraging. However, we need to do a lot more. The second aspect in which I would like to request the industry to come forward is the quantity. The training infrastructure to skill 10 million additional persons every year cannot be created by the Government alone and, therefore, during his address to the nation on Independence Day, the Prime Minister invited industry to join hands with the Government to set up institutions either by industry themselves or in public private partnership mode. This is a golden opportunity and such occasions come in the history of a nation only once in a while. I will, therefore, request the members of the industry to come forward in a big way to join hands with the Government to create world class infrastructure to impart skills to the teeming millions of youth and provide them decent employment opportunities.

India has acquired a new adjective recently. It is termed as the 'youngest nation.' Though we are one of the oldest civilizations on earth, our young population has given us this recognition. In a recent issue of 'Times' magazine, an interesting observation was made. Earlier the slogan used was "Mera Bharat Pareshan" but the country moved fast and this slogan got changed to "Mera Bharat Mahan." now because of our young population, this slogan has further changed to "Mera Bharat Jawan" which reflects new youth energy, enthusiasm and bubbling sense of confidence to reach newer and newer heights every day - be it sensex which has already crossed 17,000 mark or our young Indian Cricket Team which has won the first Twenty-Twenty World Cup. Recently, Boston consulting Group has done an analysis, according to which the whole world will face a deficit of 46 million work force by 2020 including our neighbour, China. India will be the only country which will have a surplus manpower of 47 million. So there is a golden opportunity to skill our labour force, meet domestic requirement as well as export skilled manpower to the rest of the world. We cannot let this opportunity slip from our hands. What is required is to put all our efforts together, partner with all the stakeholders with a sense of dedication in a mission mode, and we can definitely achieve the objective.

This Conference could not have been organized at more opportune time. I see here the representatives from different Ministries and Departments of Government of India, representatives of the State Governments and captains of Industry from different parts of the country. I am sure the conference will deliberate on various aspects of skill development in public private partnership mode. Our effort should be not to find fault in each other but to work together as one cohesive whole to accomplish the task. I am sure the deliberations will be guided to achieve the objective which our Hon'ble Prime Minister has set before us. I compliment FICCI and DGET who have jointly organized this Conference and wish all success to very fruitful deliberations. JAI HIND.