Employability of Indian youth through Skill oriented Higher Education

• In Event: Roundtable Session (Tuesday VI)
  In Refereed Round-Table Session: Addressing youth employment and unemployment: different approaches

Proposal

The aim of higher education in India is to provide access, equity, and quality education at affordable cost to all aspiring citizens with transparency and accountability so as to ensure sustainable economic development of the nation. It is achieved through creation, transmission and dissemination of knowledge. The Indian Institutes and Universities with its mission of developing and promoting quality technical education in the country in a coordinated and integrated manner. The constant endeavor is to encourage a meaningful association between the technical education system and research and development activities in a concerted effort aimed at nation-building. All technical educational Institutes believes in providing a proper impetus for the Institutions to generate competent employees for future. The positive approach is to create an academic ambience in the Technical Institutions for nurturing and supporting quality of future employees. The skill related education, training and job guidance reflects current thinking and practice in Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Education. It is intended to inform, enhance, and promote the development of Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Education across India higher education system. The efforts are made to draws on contemporary best practice and has been developed by experts of their own field from the Enterprise and Entrepreneurship educator community, with support from Government of India Schemes especially in Textile sector.
The demand for skilled employees in India is likely to remain high and robust in the com¬ing years, both nationally and internationally. But this would demand skilled and qualified employees. The employability of Indian youth has emerged as a major con¬cern in recent years. Ironically, it is not just the uneducated and untrained that lack skills but it is also the educated that consistently lie below the required standards. It is with this background that the study focuses on analyzing the growth and changing structure of the Indian higher education system in the light of the education profile of the Indian jobseekers, labour market demands and the employability index for India’s high-growth sectors on the basis of existing skill gaps and suggests a broad pathway to plug in the gaps and missing links. A more robust demand for personnel in technical and professional services and a better employability index for the same sectors have probably led to skewed growth of the higher education sector. The greater challenge is therefore, to prepare our larger lot of the educated graduates from the general education streams for the emerging skill needs of employable youth.
Indian Industry in textile and apparel sector plays a significant role in the Indian economy by contributing around 5% to the Indian economy. The textile and apparel sector comprises a share of 13% in the overall exports of India. India is the second largest exporter of textile and apparel goods with a global trade share of approx.5%.The sector holds importance from employment point of view as well, providing direct employment to about 51 million people and indirect employment to an additional 68 million people approximately. India has second largest textiles manufacturing infrastructure in the world after China. The skilled higher education in Fashion and textile India is being imparted by various government and private education bodies( technical Institutes and Universities).The top Institutes in India of fashion, Apparel and textile are NIFT - DELHI,NID - AHMEDABAD, PEARL ACADEMY OF FASHION – Delhi, FDDI - NOIDA, SRISHTI - BANGALORE, NIIFT – MOHALI,IDC – IIT MUMBAI, SYMBIOSIS – PUNE, IICD – JAIPUR.
The value of Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Education :
Entrepreneurship Education and the development of entrepreneurial capacity is not simply linked to employment.
Enterprise Education is an excellent tool to prepare individuals for changing environments. It provides enhanced impact through placements and activities that build links between academic institutions and external Industrial organizations. The key to the overall success of the sector may be achieved by teaching and learning; research and impact; and knowledge exchange and engagement
Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Education can have significant impact for the academic institution, through spin-out or graduate start-ups that build credibility for the institution, and through new external relationships with growth-orientated Industrial organizations. These activities combine to support the delivery of multiple strategies for the Apparel and Textile sector.
The omnipotent fact is that “Knowledge is power” in today’s scenario and this fundamental knowledge can be acquired only through the magic potion of education; hence, whatever we desire or aim to achieve as a nation depends to a humongous extent on the sheer quality, strength and finesse of the seeds of education. Today India nurtures big dreams and aspirations to become a world power thus ,be in a position to command respectful attention at a global stage of planning, leadership and action.
There has been tremendous expansion and reasonable diversification in India’s higher education but it is still largely state owned. However, the growth trends seem to be largely determined by the skill needs of a growing economy with greater emphasis on operational knowledge rather than scientific/academic knowl¬edge as in other parts of the world
The poor quality is getting reflected in the low employability of the Indian graduates both with professional and non-professional degrees and requires immediate interventions. The problem is however, more acute for the youth grad¬uating in general academic streams and in smaller towns and cities. Similarly, the participation of girls and other minority and weaker sections in professional edu¬cation is quite low. Not that no efforts were made so far to make teaching more practice oriented at the policy level. A ‘sector wide approach’ and shift in focus from quantity to quality is clearly visible in all recent government documents at all levels of education. Measures have been taken to address the issues of educa¬tional quality and employability skills by introducing various schemes at Central government level in the field of apparel and textiles to strengthen up the Indian middle class society catering to skill educated youth and investing in infrastructural develop¬ment, teacher training, faculty and curriculum development. Specific efforts have been made to integrate elements of skills delivery right from elementary to higher level of education.

Authors

• Navdeep Kaur, government

• Deepti Sharma, government