Leadership development for the public industrial training system

Abstract

One of the paradoxes of the Indian growth story must surely be that the growth of GDP by more than seven per cent per annum over the last decade and a half was achieved when the proportion of the workforce which was formally skilled continued to be very small. The National Sample Survey (NSS) 61st Round (2004-05) showed that in the age group 15-29, only about 2 per cent had received formal vocational training while about 8 per cent had received non-formal vocational training.46 This implies that most of those entering the workforce did so without any kind of formal vocational training, and that on-the-job training, or learning on the job, has been the preferred mode of training. So, is the strident policy rhetoric about the need for skilling the workforce and for closing an assumed skillgap warranted?