Hyderabad: The Telangana State government’s failure to set up a separate department for skill development has costed it hundreds of crores of Central funding.
The Centre has allocated Rs 17,273 crore in financial year 2017-18 and Rs 14,870 crore in FY2016-17 for skill development. It sought detailed project reports from the states to avail the Central funding for the skill development projects.
On the directions of the Centre, the AP government had established a separate department and a corporation for skill development. Based on the Detail Project Report sent by skill development department, the Central government had sanctioned Rs 100 crore to AP.
But there is no skill development department in Telangana. Some depa-rtments in the state have been sending the proposals on their own to the Centre, which have not been acted upon by officials in New Delhi.
Telangana State is getting only routine funds under skill development based on the Central government schemes, but it is not getting any special funds as there is no separate department.
TS Labour and Planning departments have prepared a report to set up a separate department for skill development and had sent it to Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao and he rejected the proposal.
The funds for skilling projects come from the Skill India Mission, a pet project of Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched in 2015.
The Skill India Mission aims at skilling, employment generation and providing livelihood for youth who enter the workforce every year.
Under this scheme, the state governments have to set up skill development training centres to provide market relevant training to the youth and the Central government would bear the cost of training and administration.
