New Delhi\Thiruvananthapuram: A virtual Skill @ entrepreneurship innovation conclave is organized by APAC News Network in association with the Department of Labour and Skills, Government of Kerala got off to a flying start here on Thursday. The opening day witnessed deliberations and discussions that spanned several issues pertaining to skill development in India.
Satyajeet Rajan, IAS, Additional Chief Secretary, Labour & Skills Department, Government of Kerala in his welcome address said that Kerala has been doing a lot of work and has been in the forefront of skilling. Reflecting back in the early 90s, he said that skilling was mostly confined to low key areas such as learning to type. The initiative to help farmers get into mushroom and mussel farming bore fruit. Dr Elangovan, Principal secretary, Industries and Norka, Govt of Kerala stressed on the importance of teaching finance in schools and align courses with industry.”
Apprenticeship is a basic model of training in Germany. Industries have not come forward on this front.” Praveen Kumar, IAS, Secretary, Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Government of India.
“SBI has been a pioneer in funding entrepreneurs. The bank is going digital and reduced manual intervention especially with regards to mudra loans,” said Mrigendra Lal Das, Chief General Manager, State Bank of India, Local Head Office, Thiruvananthapuram.
K Ratna Prabha, IAS Chairperson, Karnataka Skill Development Authority (KSDA), Government of Karnataka said, “After interacting with the industry, the government came to a conclusion that the need of the hour was to skill people in multi-tasking.” Mekin Maheshwari, Founder & CEO, Udhyam Learning Foundation and Co-founder, GAME was of the opinion that the demographic dividend that India enjoys also is time bound and it was essential to take advantage.”
The session ‘Role of IITs in imbibing entrepreneurial zeal to young minds’ moderated by Souvik Goswami, co-founder & Chief Group Editor, APAC News Network paved the way for interesting thoughts including enthusing IITians, role of technology, innovation and research challenges and soft skills. Of all, the need to develop soft skills was important agreed the speakers. Prof. Sudhir K. Jain , Director, IIT Gandhinagar said, “The academic world lays a lot of stress on hard skills but soft skills are hard to get and there was a great need to inculcate in the students.”
The post lunch sessions were equally interesting with Kunal Silku, Mission Director, Uttar Pradesh Skill Development Mission, Government of Uttar Pradesh, Deepthi Ravula, CEO, WEHUB, Government of Telangana,
Shrikant Sinha, CEO, TASK- Telangana Academy for Skill & Knowledge,
Government of Telangana, Jayaram State Bank of India, Local Head Office, Thiruvananthapuram explained how SBI has been in the fore front of disbursing loans to self help groups.
Various universities have been creating incubation centres. Dr Archana Mantri, Vice Chancellor, Chitkara University, Dr Sunil Shukla, Director General, Entrepreneurship Development Instituteof India, Gujarat, Dr. Krishnashree Achuthan, Dean of PG Programs, School of Engineering,Faculty of Engineering, Director, Cyber Security, Amritapuri, Director, TBI, Amritapuri, Dr Abhay Kumar, Vice Chancellor, Pratap University and Dr Vikas Singh, Executive Director, ITS Education Group explained their initiatives in their respective campuses.
Vijay K Banda Senior Director, Cyber Security, and Qualcomm India. & Co-Founder YesMentor.org spoke on “Industry 4.0 and Future of Work”. He said, “Skills are going to be a new global currency of the future.” He further added, “One may not know what kind of jobs would exist in the future as technology is changing at breakneck speed.”
