To make India the Skill Capital of the World, PM Modi inaugurated the country’s first Indian Institute of Skills (IIS) at Kanpur. PM Modi also launched few other skills development initiatives such as ‘Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Kendras (PMKKs)’. At the event the Indian Texpreneurs Federation signed an agreement with the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to train 50,000 workers between January and December next year in 15 job roles in textile mills.

According to Prabhu Dhamodharan, secretary of the federation, each worker will be trained for 45 days and the government will pay an incentive of Rs. 10,000 to the training unit.

The facilities that should be provided and the training modules have been standardized, Dhamodharan said. The mills are expected to provide employment to 90 percent of the workers.

The annual attrition rate in the mills is 30 percent to 40 per cent. Hence, the units keep recruiting new workers. Each participating mill will designate some of its staff to train the new workers. They will be trained under this scheme.

In the pilot phase of the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana about 100 member mills of the association trained 17,500 workers and this was completed eight months ago. Nearly 80 per cent of the trained workers were employed by the mills.

In the second phase of the scheme, 135 textile mills in the State are expected to train 50,000 workers in the next one year. While 70 percent of these units are in the western districts, the remaining are in other parts of the State.