A skilling crisis, not a jobs crisis: Need to make skilling a key goal towards nation-building
Skills should have been a priority after
Independence because an unskilled or unemployed Indian is not a free
Indian, and the launch of the Skill India campaign in 2015 seemed a
fresh departure from the past.
Young job-seekers are unable to get a job without experience, but it is unclear how they can get experience without a job.
Skills should have been a priority after Independence because an
unskilled or unemployed Indian is not a free Indian, and the launch of
the Skill India campaign in 2015 seemed a fresh departure from the past.
Taking a historical perspective, the phase 1 of skills in India was
largely about a purposeless drift without vision, execution or
institutions. In phase 2, while the vision was sound, but the execution
was affected by the lack of institutional structures—anybody could say
no and nobody could say yes—and the lack of nesting skills into a
broader job-creation vision. And when the Skill India campaign was
launched by our current government, it seemed promising because of three
reasons. First, it was part of a multipoint agenda for creating jobs.
Second, it struck the right balance between continuity and change. And
third, it seemed to have struck the right balance between poetry and
prose.
It was clear that Skill India was shaped based on the learning of
misgivings of the previous two attempts. We have three distinct
problems—matching (connecting demand to supply), mismatch (repairing
supply for demand) and pipeline (preparing supply for demand). We can’t
teach kids in three months what they should have learnt in 12 years of
schooling. We have witnessed the diminishing returns and value of
education where class 12 is the new class 8 and we are not even talking
about engineering yet.
We confront a financing failure; employers are not willing to pay for
skills nor candidates, but are willing to pay a premium for skilled
candidates; candidates are not willing to pay for skills, but willing to
pay for a job; and banks and microfinance institutions are not willing
to lend for skills unless a job is guaranteed. Young job-seekers are
unable to get a job without experience, but it is unclear how they can
get experience without a job.
India’s firm size distribution—6.3 crore enterprises only translate
to 18,500 companies with a paid up capital of more than Rs 10 crore—is a
binding constraint for skills because the low productivity enterprises
create the vicious circle of being unable to afford the skill wage
premium. The massive divergence between real and nominal wages in our 45
job hubs is hindering migration at the bottom of the pyramid. Finally,
college isn’t what it used to be, but the social signalling value of a
college degree matters; vocational training is usually for other
people’s children, not your children.
If we fast forward from 2015 (when Skill India got launched) to now,
according to various estimates a little over 1 crore people are expected
to enter the workforce, but there are only 60 lakh jobs being created.
There is, interestingly, no reliable source of each of these data
points, and given the crucial juncture we are at, the political rhetoric
around job crisis has become such a gotcha game that no one seems to
have the time to ask the bigger question, i.e. of the jobs that are
still being created, how many of them are being filled? Nation-building
being last on anyone’s priority list (the ardent appeals of an
unemployed youth to warring political parties in a recent television
debate left an eerie after-effect of that) and there is little consensus
being built around the huge gap that still remains in this country on
skill inadequacy.
India doesn’t have a job crisis; we have a wage crisis—everyone who
wants a job has a job, just doesn’t have the wage they aspire for. The
gap can only be resolved through a concerted effort in making Skill
India real—that’s exactly where the rubber meets the road and changes
the life of our youth. We have seen a few affirmative steps have been
taken in this direction by the central government, and under the aegis
of MSDE, Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana has been set up to enable
youth to take up industry-relevant skills training and improve their
employability. The government has also made available several other
skilling initiatives: the National Apprenticeship Training Scheme, Deen
Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana, and National Urban Livelihoods
Mission and National Rural Livelihoods Mission. Also, the National
Career Service, launched by the ministry of labour and employment, aims
to provide job-matching services in a transparent and user-friendly
manner.
However, surprisingly, the recent Union Budget speech by finance minister Arun Jaitley
seemed muted around the plan ahead for Skill India, besides the notable
exception of renewed focus on creating more options for medical
students and impetus for higher education (both benefiting the
above-average youth). At the moment, we need to focus on three things:
(1) a clear, committed strategy towards making skilling a key goal
towards nation-building—we need a sustained goldilocks approach to
skilling, rather than oscillating between hot and cold; (2) invite
co-participation amidst all political parties to come up with a shared
vision and plan around building skills for a resilient future; and (3)
create a high decibel awareness that paves the way for the right skills
for the right jobs.
India’s war on poverty cannot be won without skilling India. We may
still not get there, but let’s start with what’s necessary, then do what
is possible, and then suddenly we would be doing what is impossible.
By Rituparna Chakraborty, President, Indian Staffing Federation, and co-founder, TeamLease
IN CASE OF REPEAT PLAGIARISM OF OVER 60% SIMILARITY, THE FACULTY MEMBERS WILL BE SUSPENDED, EVEN DISMISSED
NEWDELHI: Student researchers who plagiarise may lose their registration
and teachers who do could lose their jobs with the University Grants
Commission (UGC) approving a draft regulation on plagiarism which will
be notified after approval by the HRD ministry.
Plagiarism in higher academia is a huge problem in India and UGC, the
apex body of higher education institutions, has been threatening to come
out with a plagiarism law for several years now .
It finally approved the UGC (Promotion of Academic Integrity and
Prevention of Plagiarism in Higher Education Institutions) regulations
2018 in its meeting held on March 20. HT has seen the minutes of the
meeting. The law prescribes graded punishment for plagiarism.
The draft rules for students states that in non-core areas,
plagiarism of up to 10% would not invite any penalty while between 10%
and 40% would mean students will have to submit a revised research paper
within six months.
In case the similarities are between 40% and 60%, students will be
debarred from submitting a revised paper for one year. A student’s
registration for a programme will be cancelled if the similarities are
above 60%. Teachers whose academic and research papers have similarities
ranging from 10% to 40% with other papers will be asked to withdraw the
manuscript.
In case the similarities are between 40% and 60%, they will not be
allowed to supervise new Masters/ MPhil/PhD students for two years and
will also be denied the right to one annual increment. In case of repeat
plagiarism of over 60% similarity, the faculty members will be
suspended, even dismissed.
“I am all for checking plagiarism. We have very lax standards and
that is what seems to have prompted government to propose such a law,”
said Dinesh Singh, ex-vice-chancellor, DU.
“It would have been better if universities had strong internal mechanisms as in so many other countries,” he said.
India has been witness to several plagiarism charges against central
university vice-chancellors and teachers in the past few years.
Pondicherry University V-C Chandra Krishnamurthy quit in 2016 after a
prolonged stand-off with the HRD ministry, following allegations that
she plagiarized large parts of a book mentioned in her resume. The most
celebrated case is that of BS Rajput, the VC of Kuamon University, who
was a serial plagiarist; eventually, seven Stanford University
professors wrote to then President APJ Abdul Kalam about him.
According to UGC, all higher educational institutions will have to
develop a policy on plagiarism and get it approved by relevant statutory
bodies/authorities and display it on their websites.
In September last year, UGC formed a committee and sought public feedback on a proposed plagiarism policy in September.
“Meantime, a communication was received from the MHRD on
implementation of the reforms proposed in a meeting taken by the
Principal secretary to the Prime Minister on 16 September 2017 regarding
reform in higher education. One of the action points mentioned in the
meeting was related to the regulation on plagiarism wherein it was
desired that UGC should also consult with IITs and IIMs for uniformity
in regulation on anti-plagiarism,” reads the minutes of the meeting.
Many of the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian
Institutes of Management have stringent anti-plagiarism policies. Some
even use software to identify instances of plagiarism in student
submissions.
According to UGC, all departments in higher educational
institutions will notify a departmental academic integrity panel (DAIP)
which will investigate the matters and will submit its recommendations
to the Institutional Academic Integrity Panel (IAIP) of the higher
educational institution.
As ‘plogging’ sweeps through Thane, joggers pick up garbage bags to burn calories in Yeoor forests
THANE:
Are garbage dumps and litter deterring you from going on that
much-needed jog? Maybe you can try plogging, the latest fitness craze
that has descended on Thane. On Sunday, 200 fitness enthusiasts in
jogging shoes and sweatbands, armed with litter collection bags, entered
the Yeoor forest range at 6am and picked up trash strewn across the
roads while trotting forth. This is perhaps the first plogging movement
in the state. The trend is said to have been conceptualised by the
Swedes and has been replicated globally thereafter.
The Yeoor drive was organised by NGOs Earthkids Humanity Foundation
and Yeoor Environmental Society, with the help of the civic body.
Mayur
Jamdhade (28), a coaching institute owner who went with 30 students
said, “It was an amazing three-hour ex-perience. We keep talking and
reading about the ill-effects of waste and plastic, we got a firsthand
experience.” The joggers started from Yeoor Gate and went up to
Patonpada area—a 4.5km stretch—picking up plastic, wrappers and whatever
waste came their way.
Founder of Earthkids Tarun Gautam, a
retired Indian Air Force officer, said, “I was posted at Yeoor Air Force
station a few years ago and organized numerous clean -up drives in the
green zone. But they were not as effective as they were on a
small-scale. A few months ago, I read about plogging and realised that
Yeoor sees hundreds of joggers everyday.” “We also hope that this
initiative helps curb flooding during monsoon. We plan to hold the drive
once a month,” said Rohit Joshi, member NGO Yeoor Environmental
Society.
While
the drive proved to be successful, NGO volunteers worked
round-the-clock for the past two weeks to spread the word. “We went up
to each jogger around Upvan in mornings and evenings and explained to
them the importance of this initiative. We also reached out to citizens
on social media.
While we had 100 registrations, more than 200 turned up on Sunday,” Joshi said.
On
Sunday, two civic waste collection vans were filled up with the litter
collected by these enthusiasts. “Yesterday, the municipal corporation
arranged for waste cans. However, when I go daily, there are barely any.
Those that exist are overflowing. Civic bodies should add more bins and
speed up waste pick-up process. The movement will succeed if government
and citizens come together and replicate it everywhere,” said Vikram
Khade (34).
Speaking
about the relationship between fitness and environment, international
marathoner Dr Mahesh Bedekar said, “Sportspersons always participate in
green initiatives as they know environment impacts health. While
plogging is a fairly new concept, athletes have been known to take up
green initiatives. But I do not know how many want to stop and pick up
waste.” The drive also had its share of entertainment as some groups
performed song and dance.
