In a boost to Skill India Mission, the government has joined hands with the World Bank for upgrading 400 Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) across the country. The World Bank will make financial infusion of $280 million in the form of assistance for the upgradation of the ITIs spread over 34 states and Union Territories (UTs).

Union Minister for Skill Development Rajiv Pratap Rudy informed the Lok Sabha that the government has partnered with the World Bank as part of the Vocational Training Improvement Project (VTIP).

The Minister informed that there are two other projects which have been approved by the screening committee of Department of Economic Affairs for assistance from the World Bank.

The two projects include ‘Skill Training for Employability Leveraging Public Private Partnership’ which has been backed by the World Bank with assistance of $1 billion and ‘Skill Strengthening for Industries Value Enhancement’ with an estimated cost of $537.50 million to be shared by World Bank and the government on 50:50 basis.

The Minister said that the government is aiming to rope in private players for the upgradation of the ITIs.

“The project to upgrade the ITIs will be executed in a public-private-partnership (PPP) mode,” said Rudy.

He also stated that the government has constituted an Institute Management Committee at ITI level with the chairmanship from the industry in a bid to institutionalise association of the industry.

The project would be executed in partnership with state governments. Rudy said that the fund sharing under the project is in the ratio of 75:25 to be shared between the Centre and the states, while the ratio would be 90:10 in the case for the Northeastern States.

The Centre has already allocated an amount of Rs 2-3.5 crore for each of these 400 ITIs under VTIP for improvement on the basis of the Institutional Development Plan.

Giving details of the fund allocation so far, Rudy said that Rs 1,739 crore has been allocated to the states/union territories. The Centre has been informed by the states/UTs that the amount of Rs 1,486 crore has been utilised till December 2015.

Incidentally, the Centre is executing the Skill Mission with the objective that the creation and updation of infrastructure for imparting skill training is demand driven and dynamic, requiring regular up-gradation.

The Central government has been working on the skilling project since 2007 and so far has sought to upgrade 1396 ITIs through PPP mode. The government has so far been able to cover 1227 ITIs from 31 States/UTs with an allocation of Rs 3067.50 crore as interest fee loan to the Institute Management Committees (IMCs) set up in each of the institutions.

The government has stated that the scheme objective includes enhancement of knowledge and skills of ITI instructors by strengthening facilities in 14 central institutes that impart pre-service and in-service instructor training.

Over 15000 instructors have been trained under refresher and specialized courses by the central institutes. Over 18000 instructors have also been trained through ‘Distance Learning Program’.