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| Chief minister Tarun Gogoi inagurates the skill development programme at NEDFi House in Guwahati on Friday. Picture by UB Photos |
Guwahati, May 4: Dispur has formulated a scheme to impart training to two lakh youths in identified employable trades during the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-2017).
In the first phase, 150 youths will be imparted training under the multi-disciplinary skill development programme (MDSP), which was inaugurated by chief minister Tarun Gogoi here today.
“This scheme will go a long way to mitigate unemployment, which is considered one of the burning problems of Assam. The need for arming youths with soft and hard skills has been felt over the years. Development and creation of jobs are a priority and with time, new jobs require new skills like the skills required to be a tattoo artist or a beautician to cite a few examples,” Gogoi said while addressing the gathering at the function.
The flagship programme taken up by the industries and commerce department during 2011-12, aims to provide skill development training in demand-based employable trades and extend handholding support to youths for acquiring jobs. The training will comprise soft skills development for capacity building, hard skills development in employable trades, skills upgrade of local entrepreneurs and setting up a job studio.
“The department has carried out a resource mapping survey across the state to determine the natural and human resources available in the districts. For example, in regard to water hyacinth, it was found that Morigaon and Golaghat were the resource-rich districts,” industries and commerce minister Pradyut Bordoloi said.
The department will first set up four multi-disciplinary skill development training centres at Badarpurghat (Karimganj), Bilasipara (Dhubri), Bajiagaon (Nagaon) and Margherita (Tinsukia), besides upgrading the existing facilities at the Cottage Industries Training Institute in Kalapahar here.
“Another 23 centres will come up during 2012-13 under a plan to provide one centre to each district of the state. The department has proposed to create 219 training centres covering every block in the state, in a bid to impart training to two lakh youths by end of the 12th Plan in 2017,” Bordoloi said.
Till the centres come up, training under the scheme will be arranged in institutes such as the National Academy of Construction, Hyderabad, MSME Tool Room Training Centre, Guwahati, Central Institute of Plastic Engineering & Technology (CIPET), Changsari, National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC), National Centre for Design and Product Development, New Delhi, among others.
A total of 4,359 micro and small units had filed the entrepreneurship memoranda- form 1 (intent to invest) from January 1 to July 18 last year, with an expected workforce requirement of 1,85,726 people in different sectors.
Along with modernisation of the industrial sector, the need for a demand-driven skilled workforce in the manufacturing and service sectors has increased.
Besides, the existing trades taught in the industrial training institutes (ITIs) and other vocational institutes are not compatible to meet the demands in the modern industrial scenario.
The industry department in its mission for providing handholding support will also create a job studio cell in 2012-13 where a database of skills of trained persons and the requirement of skilled manpower for industries would be maintained. The information will also be uploaded in the departmental e-portal.
“The need for skilled manpower goes back to 2006, the year before foundation of the gas cracker project at Lepetkata, when 4,000 bighas were required for the project. Those who had to part with their land had demanded semi and skilled jobs for at least one member of the family. Of the 14,000 workers that the project demanded, there was a requirement for 5,000 skilled labourers. Towards that end, we had in 2007 selected youths from Tinsukia, Sivasagar, Dibrugarh and Jorhat districts and sent them in batches to the National Academy of Construction in Hyderabad for training,” the industry minister added.
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