Skill development: Punjab has big plans for youth

CHANDIGARH: Punjab is slated to go big on skill development. With chief minister Parkash Singh Badal guiding the national skill development initiative, the state has laid down a series of action plans to train youth in various vocational and joboriented skills.

The finance minister on Tuesday announced setting up of 200 skill development centres for training in rural areas. He said the Punjab Skill Development Mission set up under the chief minister as a nodal agency to spearhead skill development initiatives in the state would set up five MultiSkill Development Centres (MSDCs) at Amritsar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur and Bathinda.

Construction work on five MSDCs has been started, which will become functional by June and would be able to train 10,000 youth a year.

The mission, in partnership with the department of medical education, is also setting up three skill development centres in health sector at medical colleges in Patiala, Faridkot and Amritsar. These centres will run health- related skill training courses identified through the Health Sector Skill Council. These centres will be operational by June and will train 3,000 youth a year.

The mission, in partnership with the department of labour, is setting up four skill training centres in the construction sector at SAS Nagar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar and Amritsar. These centres will be ready by October and will be able to train 5,000 youth a year. The Mission is also setting up two skill training centres in automobile sector, one in agriculture and one in animal husbandry sector. An allocation of Rs 150 crore is made for 201617 under the Skill Development Mission.

Under this, 26 training partners have been empanelled and given the combined targets of imparting skills to 50,000 youth under Ajeevika and other schemes in the state. Government ITI, Ludhiana, is being upgraded into model ITI, for which private training partner has been identified and the training is likely to start in June 2016.