Home » Blog » Skill India Needs a Rethink: From Token Training to Transformative Impact

When the Government of India launched the Skill India Mission in 2015, it aimed at equipping the youth of India with employable skills. With over 65% of its population under the age of 35 years, India is a young nation with immense possibilities. The mission was to skill people in market-relevant skills, create employment opportunities, and build an independent workforce.

For young Indians, particularly from humble backgrounds, ground reality is different. After completing school—poorly educated and trained in many cases—they encounter a complicated web of vocational training courses, few of which provide genuine livelihood opportunities.

There are five broad streams of vocational education and training in India:

• Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs)—more than 14,000, mostly private.
• Vocational education in schools—provided optionally in classes 9 to 12.
• Short-term schemes of the Ministry of Skill Development & Entrepreneurship like Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY).
• Other ministry-operated schemes, e.g., the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana.
• Apprenticeship schemes, one to two years in duration.

Despite all these options, most young people find themselves either in the government programs or in the informal economy with unspecified outcomes. The government is the foremost supporter of vocational training, and the formal private sector contributes marginally in the areas of long-term jobs or infrastructure.

The Number Game: A Breeding Ground for Fraud

Skill India appears to be more concerned with enrollment numbers than outcomes. Owing to inadequate infrastructure and trainers at most centers, certified youth remain unemployed. Training providers prioritize targets over quality. Trainees take courses just for stipends. Frauds run high, with false attendance, ghost admissions, and inflated placements. Skill India tracks numbers on the web but ignores quality follow-up. It hardly ensures trainees receive sustainable jobs or employers are happy. Fraudulent providers in nearly all states operate without any penalty.

The government states that 1.52 crore youth have been trained under PMKVY to date, up to January 2024. Only 22.6 lakh candidates, i.e., less than 15%, have found employment. Research indicates that training providers funded by NSDC have enjoyed a long-term employability rate of merely 22%, pointing towards a weak alignment between training and labour market demands.

The Rise of Short-Term Certifications

While there has been a moderate increase in formal vocational training to 4.1%, informal training channels—of which hereditary (from 1.45% in 2017 to 11.6% in 2023) and on-the-job training (from 2.04% in 2017 to 9.3% in 2023)—have skyrocketed. This increase is most probably because of the mass implementation of Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL), whereby employees are given certificates for skills already gained in courses typically under 24 hours.

Even the duration of skill development courses has reduced substantially. Whereas 29% of vocational trainees were covered under courses lasting two years and above in 2017–18, it came down to a paltry 14.29% in 2023–24. Those trained under less than six months’ courses increased, however, from 22% to 44%.

Short-term training (STT) dominates government initiatives like PMKVY and Jan Shikshan Sansthan (JSS), with the shortest duration being a mere 10 days for some schemes. With all the hubris about 50%-plus placement achievements by PMKVY, independent data indicate all-time placement levels of just 22.16%. The trend is disturbing on a fundamental level: individuals receive certificates in no time but lack skills or confidence to find gainful employment.

The unemployment rate among formally trained individuals remains persistently high at 17%, compared to a scant 4% among the informally trained. This disparity reflects the gap between certificates and real competence.

Fix the Syllabus, Fuel the Future

Most Skill India initiatives are based on outdated syllabi that cannot keep pace with current job market requirements. For example, vocational training in such trades as stitching, handicrafts, or simple data entry persists while automation and digital change reshape work profiles.

According to the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2022-23, sectors such as IT services, logistics, healthcare, and renewable energy are expanding at an extremely rapid rate and require skilled people. However, these sectors are either lacking or totally absent in Skill India initiatives. In addition to this, there is no convergence between the technical intensity of emerging jobs and the expertise imparted under the current curriculum.

Lack of Post-Training Paths

Certification is often the end point. Support provisions for job placement, apprenticeship, or entrepreneurship are scarce.

The National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) lacks an efficient tracking system to monitor the career progression of the certified workforce. As per a 2023 report published by the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), only 12% of Skill India beneficiaries were provided with any career guidance following training.

Moreover, the lack of integration between training programs and actual job roles creates a mismatch. Trainees are either overemployed or unemployed in industries that are unrelated. The Ministry of Skill Development has not developed adequate bridge courses or industry linkages to ensure smoother transitions.

The trainees have also reported being steered into unpaid internships or extremely low-paying jobs, especially in high-cost-of-living cities. This makes further work too expensive, and most leave the labour force altogether.

Bureaucratic Inefficiencies and Leadership Failures

“The problem isn’t that no one is in charge. It’s that too many are, none accountable.” — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Skill development is spread across several ministries and programs, causing overlap and disorientation. Large numbers of youths are unable to access the system due to lack of coordination and paperwork.

Leadership has also been a point of weakness. In May 2025, the NSDC issued a public notice announcing that it was ending its COO (officiating CEO), Ved Mani Tiwari. It has been reported that he was never officially appointed and had taken on the CEO designation under the nose of the government.

There is a nearly complete dependence of the operation of NSDC on government grants in the form of the National Skill Development Fund. Over ₹10,000 crore has so far been invested in the Skill India initiative, much of which has been channelled through NSDC.

The National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme (NAPS), which started in 2016 with an allocation of ₹10,000 crore for training 50 lakh apprentices by 2020, was way behind; only 20 lakh apprentices were trained up to 2022, and only ₹650 crore was disbursed to states from 2017–2022. Although NAPS 2.0 was launched in 2023, no fresh performance numbers have been announced.

In spite of the recent reforms to the Apprenticeship Act, the numbers are disheartening: there are just over half a million apprentices within the overall number of 570 million workers as of 2022–23, up from 2.5 lakh ten years ago.

Promises Broken: How Skill India Lost Transparency in Project Implementation

Out of the 1,390 projects that were featured on the NSDC dashboard, over 500 lacked completion or could not be authenticated, The New Indian probe has discovered. A few were still being funded when they did not possess any documents.

190 projects were labelled “completed” but never issued certificates. A few of them had discrepancies in financial needs and land use. RTIs sought under information on this were delayed or rejected, throwing up a serious transparency deficit.

The Way Forward: Reimagining Skill India

Regardless of its present shortcomings, the Skill India Mission still holds immense promise. India is at a historic juncture—with the world’s biggest youth population, increasing digital connectivity, and growing economic aspirations. If we make the right course correction now, we can unleash a workforce which not only survives, but thrives.

What we require is a change in thinking: from box-ticking to nation-building. From awarding certificates to developing creatives, problem-solvers, and leaders of the future.

Here’s how we can reinvigorate Skill India with hope and a sense of direction:

• Celebrate Skills as a National Strength

Let’s give dignity back to practical work. Each trade job—plumbing, coding, medicine, or solar repair must be considered a column of India’s development. We must have a cultural turnaround that honours mastery of skills, not college degrees.

• Link Learning to Livelihood

A skilling environment that lets every learner visualize a dignified employment, business opportunity, or further learning. When young people visualize career advancement, they commit with zeal.

• Involve Industry as a Co-Creator, not a Spectator

Make India’s top industries co-share skilling infrastructure and curriculum development. Apprenticeships, compensated internships, and joint branded courses will make training relevant and desirable.

• Local Solutions, National Vision

Empower districts, small towns, and villages to implement need-based training in local languages—true to demand. Allow a girl in Bastar to learn to maintain drones or a boy from Bihar to learn about deploying AI if the market demands it.

• Leverage India’s Digital DNA

There are smartphones in every pocket today. Online learning has the potential to be a game-changer. Combine traditional training with AR/VR, AI-based tests, and mentorship platforms for a future-capable experience.

• From Job Seekers to Job Creators

Foster entrepreneurial spirits. Provide youth with the wherewithal to initiate micro-enterprises, cooperatives, or startups. Skilling must not only fuel the job market must increase it.

• Inclusion as Innovation

Get women, Dalits, Adivasis, and the differently-abled into the centre of the mission. Their engagement is not equity. it’s smart economics. Inclusive national growth is real national growth.

Conclusion

India’s vocational education system has reduced to a numbers game, wherein certificates are mass-produced without skill acquisition. The increased use of short-term training, the poor employment outcome, and exaggerated placement figures are evidence of systemic failures.

If at all India is serious about becoming a global skill centre, it has to focus on quality and not quantity, invest in long-term training programs and enhance private sector accountability in vocational training and not just have them as spectators. Anything less would be a betrayal of the hopes of millions of young Indians for a better future.

Skilling cannot be done as a gesture, but as investing in the future of the country. The time has come to restore credibility and meaning to this cause so that it is not being done for figures, but for people.

“Let us make India the skill capital of the world. Let our youth be job creators, not just job seekers.” — Prime Minister Narendra Modi