India has world’s largest youth population. More than half of India’s population is in working age group. This throws an opportunity to harness this demographic dividend by focusing on human capital development through technical and vocational education training (TVET). If done correctly India can become global supplier of skilled workforce. Realizing this opportunity Govt. of India has designed an Institutional structure led by Ministry of Skill development & Entrepreneurship (MSDE) to evolve an eco-system for skill development training involving Govt. bodies, Industry & Industry Association, Private Sector, Bi-lateral & Multilateral agencies and Civil Society and has set a target to train 400 million youth by 2022 under National Skill Development Mission(NSDM). Govt. is in process of setting up a regulator namely National Council for Vocational Education & Training (NCVET) to upgrade quality, uniformity and standardization. Other key Institutions are National Skill Development Corporations (NSDC), Directorate General of Training, State Skill Development Missions (SSDMs) and Industry bodies such as FICCI & CII at national level.

Govt. has launched multiple scheme such as Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojna (PMKVY), National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme (NAPS), Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Kendras (PMKK), Deen Dyal Upadhyay Grameen Kaushal Yojna (DDUGKY) and others to provide Short-Term Skill Trainings, Recognition to prior learning (RPL) and Apprenticeship aligned with National Skill Qualification Framework (NSQF). In addition, programs like Vocationalisationof Secondary Education for school students, Community college and Bachelor of Vocation (B.Voc) for university students integrates vocational education with formal education. Key challenges are quality of basic education at primary & secondary level, quality of skill training by training providers, less investment by private sector, lack of infrastructure for simulated training, industry connect, low wages, migration, aspirational mismatch, fast paced emerging technologies etc. However India still has time to learn and take the corrective action as window for demographic dividend in India is available till year 2055-56, longer than any country in the world.  Also interestingly demographic dividend window is available at different times in different states because of differential behaviour of the population parameters.

KEYWORDS: TVET, MSDE, NCVET, NSQF, PMKVY, PMKK, Skill Training.