Training, placement of rural youth plunges in FY21

The number of rural youth who were trained and placed under the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana (DDU-GKY) plunged sharply in FY21.

The number of youth trained fell 87 per cent to 30,616 in FY21 from about 2.44 lakh a year earlier, according to data available on DDU-GKY website. Placements dropped 67 per cent to 49,455 from about 1.5 lakh in FY20.

The number of youth trained and placed dropped even after rural areas were flooded as workers in cities returned to their villages due to lockdowns imposed to curb the spread of COVID-19 last year.

According to Prashant Singh, vice president and business head-compliance and payroll outsourcing at TeamLease Services, the vaccination drive that started in January may have encouraged migrants to return to their workplaces in the towns and cities.

The scheme’s target is to train and get jobs for 28,82,677 rural youth by March 2022.

Odisha has placed the highest number of youth at 1,35,837, followed by Andhra Pradesh (69,168), Jammu & Kashmir (60,594), Tamil Nadu (44,644) and Telangana (37,799), according to data on the website.

The highest number of trained youth also come from Odisha at 1,83,382, followed by Uttar Pradesh (1,25,190), Jammu & Kashmir (84,828) and Rajasthan (64,168).

DDU-GKY is a placement-linked skill development programme that the Ministry of Rural Development started in September 2014. It is a part of the National Rural Livelihood Mission offering placements to the rural youth.

The scheme focuses on rural youth aged 15 to 35 from poor families.

For social inclusion, DDU-GKY provides mandatory coverage to socially disadvantaged groups - SC/ST 50 per cent, women 33 per cent, minorities 15 per cent, and people with different abilities about 3 per cent.

So far, 11.09 lakh youth have been trained and about 6.45 lakh have been placed under the scheme.