Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) through National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) is imparting on-line skilling through ‘e-SkillIndia’ platform in the midst of COVID-19 lockdown. Further, Ministry of Home Affairs has permitted the conduct of skill training programmes in physical form from September 21, 2020 onwards. Accordingly, Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) has been issued by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) for restarting the training.

Under PMKVY, as on 17.03.2020, 42.02 lakh and 33.66 lakh candidates have been trained and certified, respectively, under Short Term Training (STT) courses. Out of these certified candidates, 17.54 lakh candidates have been provided with placement. Also, 49.12 lakh candidates who already have the informal skills but are not formally certified have been oriented under Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) component of the scheme.

Various initiatives have been taken to enhance placement of the certified candidates. Some of the major initiatives are as follows:

• Training Providers/ Training Centres (TPs/TCs) have to organize Rozgar Melas with the support of Sector Skill Councils;
• Last tranche of payment (i.e. 20% of total training funds) to TPs/TCs is based on placement of certified candidates;
• Additional incentives are given to TPs/TCs for placing candidates above the minimum required level;
• Allocation of fresh targets to TPs/TCs is based on their placement performance.

This information was given by the Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Shri R.K. Singh in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha today.