-By Vartika Bhatewara
It has been projected that by the year 2020, 62% of India’s population will be between the age group of 15 and 59 years. This is what is known as India’s demographic dividend. This means that while the average age of citizens in other countries is on the rise, a majority of India’s population will be in the employable age group. The question that arises here and one that has been on the minds of many Indians is; does the demographic dividend contain in it a ticking time bomb or will we be able to use this as an opportunity to realize our dream of India Shining?
There has been a lot of talk about the opportunity divide in India. This Opportunity Divide is that by the year 2022, 800 million people will be in the working age group but out of these only 200 million will be graduates while the remaining will be in the unskilled group. According to research done by NSDC, between the year 2008 and 2022, 347 million jobs will be created across 22 different high growth sectors in India. For example, the jobs available in the construction industry will be about 33 million, in the auto industry about 35 million, in infrastructure 103 million and in retail about 14 million jobs will be available.
The interesting fact here is that India will have both the jobs as well as a matching demographic of population that will have the potential to carry out these jobs. The question is will we be able to train so many people? The Indian government has set a target of training 500 million people by the year 2022, but is this target achievable?
The target definitely is a daunting number. As an Indian I do hope that this dream is realized and am proud to be working for an organization that has done some exemplary work in this field. Pratham Institute has trained over 70,000 people through its various vocational training programs and is in the process of training more. I hope that people who come across this blog also find a way to contribute towards India’s future. Maybe then we’ll have the answer to the question raised by the title of this blog.
The number of youth by the year 2020 is a daunting number. And unless we are able to help these individuals see a bright future for themselves, we have a huge problem on our hands. Different entities which include the govt, corporate sector, skill development institutes need to come together to ensure there are opportunities available and young minds doing what they should do.
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