Mathur Ritika Passi

Do young people have the skills necessary
to be productive members of the labour
force? 16 million workers enter the
workforce annually. Currently, only 10%
of the workforce receives some kind of
skilling against a national target of 25%.
By 2022, over a 100 million will enter
the labour force and need skilling. On the
demand side, industry across 24 sectors
will need 110 million people by 2022. If
the incoming labour force is completely
skilled, it will match the projected demand
from industry. Currently, there are
approximately 300 million people in the
workforce in the 15-45 age group across
the farm and non-farm sectors that are
unskilled or semi-skilled against available
skilling capacity of four million. 10
The scorecard for India across these
various targets show that India has
progressed on enrolment rates but
not fast enough on other parameters
nationwide—and has actually regressed
on learning outcomes in some years. The
national numbers also mask significant
variations across states, especially in
learning. The northern and central Hindispeaking
belt fares the worst (Rajasthan,
Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkand, Madhya
Pradesh), followed closely by eastern states
(Chattisgarh, West Bengal, Orissa). The
southern states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu
fare the best.
Can India achieve the SDG on education?
From the data above, at the current rates
of progress, the answer is no. Based on
past trends, a third of students who enrol
in grade I will still not reach grade X.
Learning outcomes and adult literacy
rates are stagnating, and nearly 40 years
of ICDS programming has not been able
to significantly dent national malnutrition
rates or improve early childhood learning.
India currently has neither the capacity to
train all its entrants to the labour force, nor
the jobs to hire all of them if it did. The
targets that are most at risk are 4.1, 4.2
and 4.6—those that focus on universalising
primary, secondary access and learning,
quality pre-primary that makes children
ready to learn and adult literacy. Some
states may succeed on some targets, but
for India to achieve all targets within a
fifteen-year time frame requires urgent and
fundamental shifts in government policy
and action.
Moving Forward: A Decade-Long
Mission for Education
Few countries have shown the ability to
simultaneously improve on so many fronts.
India is no exception. But the SDGs offer a
window of opportunity. The education goal
and its targets are strongly aligned with the
aspirations of India’s young population and
with its economic needs. Achieving SDG 4
will build strong foundations for economic
prosperity—but this will not happen in a
business-as-usual mode.
India requires a Decade-Long Mission
for Education—a multi-year project built
around national consensus, cutting across
political and regional differences, that
moves the country in the direction of the
SDG targets. This chapter describes these
components but omits discussion on those
areas where the Government of India
already has flagship programmes, such
as Skill India. It identifies those specific
policies without which achieving the SDG
is impossible.
It is important to recognise one truism—
strong government action, at the Centre
and in states, will drive achievement of
SDG 4. No country in the world has
achieved education outcomes similar to
the SDGs without sustained and effective
public investment, and a responsive,
effective system that supports it.
ICDS 2.0
Neuroscience has now confirmed that
the foundations of brain architecture and
functioning are created in early childhood
in a process that is guided by external
influence. 11 The growth and pruning of
neuronal systems in early years support
early skills, including cognitive, social and
emotional and executive function skills. 12
Each skill is predictive of school success,
higher earnings, active participation in
society, and lower odds of delinquency,
crime, and chronic and non-communicable
disease. Therefore, investment in early
childhood care results in greater cost
savings than investment later in the life
cycle. 13
Despite its four-decade history, the ICDS
has not succeeded nationally. Moving
forward, ICDS implementation will require
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