About 40 percent of India’s total workforce need reskilling to keep up with emerging trends of AI, IoT, machine learning and blockchain, according to a NASSCOM report.
The Indian government is planning to expand its ‘Skill India’ initiative with dedicated policies to create a workforce capable of handling emerging tech trends.
As reported by the Economics Times, the government is considering a national policy for reskilling and upskilling Indian youth in areas like artificial intelligence (AI), internet of things (IoT) and machine learning.
“Reskilling and upskilling is big on the incoming government’s agenda. There will be renewed focus on reskilling,” a senior government official was quoted as saying.
The official also revealed that the government has identified over half a dozen sectors in which a dedicated curriculum for reskilling will be developed based on demand from these sectors. Some of the identified sectors include banking, manufacturing, financial services, insurance, e-commerce, retail, healthcare, logistics, and telecoms.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Skill India Mission
India’s total workforce stands at nearly 500 million and according to a Nasscom report, about 40 percent of these workers (~200 million people) need to be reskilled over the next five years to cope with emerging trends such as AI, IoT, machine learning and blockchain.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched the Skill India Mission in 2015. It aims to impart skills training to 400 million people by 2022 through flagship schemes such as the Pradhan Mantri Rojgar Prohatsan Yojana, the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana and the National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme.
India is also expected to be in the top three big data analytics markets by 2020. NASSCOM predicts the India Analytics industry to reach $16 billion marks by 2025.
