Higher education, skills and employment

The first principle

A degree is worth what it lets a young person do, and a country's universities are worth what they add to its knowledge and its workforce. India has expanded higher education rapidly over the last two decades, yet employers still say graduates lack skills while graduates struggle to find work that matches their degrees. The task is to rebuild the bridges between three systems that grew apart, namely education, skilling and the labour market, and to keep the gates between them, from entrance tests to recruitment examinations, fair and trusted.

The core

Higher education

• Scale and access. The gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher education, the share of the 18 to 23 age group enrolled, was about 28.4 per cent in 2021 to 22 according to the All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE). The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 sets a target of 50 per cent by 2035.
• Multidisciplinary institutions. NEP wants single stream colleges to grow into large multidisciplinary universities and clusters, ending the sharp separation of arts, science and professional streams, with a four year undergraduate degree as an option.
• Flexibility. Multiple entry and exit lets a student leave with a certificate after one year, a diploma after two or a degree after three or four, and the Academic Bank of Credits (2021) stores credits so that a student can return or change institutions without starting again.
• Regulation. NEP proposes a single umbrella regulator, the Higher Education Commission of India, to replace the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education and the National Council for Teacher Education, separating regulation, accreditation, funding and standard setting.
• Research. The Anusandhan National Research Foundation Act, 2023 set up a foundation chaired by the Prime Minister to fund and coordinate research, with about ₹50,000 crore over five years, much of it expected from industry, and especially to build research in state universities.
• Internationalisation. UGC regulations of 2023 allow foreign universities of high standing to set up campuses in India with freedom over fees and admissions, and Deakin and Wollongong universities have opened campuses in the Gujarat International Finance Tec City (GIFT City) under separate rules for the international financial centre.

Public examinations and the 2024 Act

Leaks of question papers in recruitment and entrance examinations damage the trust that makes merit based selection legitimate, and they fall hardest on poor candidates who spend years preparing. Parliament responded with the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024, notified in June 2024.

• Aims. It seeks transparency, fairness and credibility in public examinations by punishing organised leaks, impersonation, tampering with answer sheets or computer systems, fake websites and fake examinations. It targets organised networks, officials and service providers; a candidate's own misconduct remains under the examining body's administrative rules.
• Penalties. All offences are cognisable, non bailable and non compoundable. An individual faces three to five years' imprisonment and a fine of up to ₹10 lakh; a service provider faces a fine of up to ₹1 crore, recovery of the cost of the examination and a four year bar; organised crime draws five to ten years and a fine of at least ₹1 crore.
• Investigation. Cases are investigated by an officer not below the rank of Deputy Superintendent of Police, and the Centre can transfer a case to a central agency.
• Coverage. The Act applies to public examinations held by the authorities in its Schedule: the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC), the Staff Selection Commission (SSC), the Railway Recruitment Boards, the Institute of Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS), the National Testing Agency, and central ministries and departments recruiting staff, along with any authority the Centre notifies.
• What it leaves out. University examinations, state board examinations and state public service commission examinations are not listed, so they fall under state laws. Rajasthan, Gujarat, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh, among others, have passed their own anti paper leak laws, and the central Act is meant to serve as a model for the rest.

Dimensions

• Welfare and investment. Seen as a welfare duty, education is owed to every citizen as part of dignity and equal opportunity; seen as a strategic investment, it builds the scientists, engineers and skilled workers a knowledge economy needs. India needs both, because a system that serves only the top produces excellence without breadth, and one that serves only access produces breadth without quality.
• Equity. Expansion has brought more first generation, rural and women students into colleges, but quality is concentrated in a few institutions, and fees in private colleges keep the best seats away from poor students.
• Economic. India's working age population will grow for about two more decades, and the demographic dividend depends on turning young people into productive workers before the population ages.
• Federal. Most students study in state universities and their affiliated colleges, which receive far less money than central institutions, so national targets depend on state budgets.

In practice

The skilling system

• Skill India (2015) and the policy. The Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE), created in 2014, launched Skill India and the National Policy for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship in 2015 to train young people at scale and give skills the same standing as degrees.
• Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY), 2015. It offers free short term training through accredited centres and certifies existing workers through recognition of prior learning. The National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC, 2008), a public private partnership, funds private training providers.
• Apprenticeship. Under the Apprentices Act, 1961 and the National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme (NAPS, 2016), the government shares part of an apprentice's stipend with the employer, and the National Apprenticeship Training Scheme does the same for graduates and diploma holders.
• Credit and quality. The National Council for Vocational Education and Training (2018) regulates training bodies, and the National Credit Framework (NCrF, 2023) lets credits from school, skilling and higher education add up across one scale.
• Vocational education in NEP. NEP aims to expose at least half of all learners to vocational education by 2025, integrated into schools and colleges rather than kept in a separate, lower status track.

Earn while you learn

"Earn while you learn" means paid work that is part of a course: apprenticeships, apprenticeship embedded degrees and on campus work. It keeps poor students enrolled because they need not choose between study and income, and it gives them the workplace experience employers ask for. In Germany's dual system most vocational learners train inside firms, while in India apprentices remain a very small part of the workforce because small firms find the paperwork costly and stipends are low. Strengthening it needs simpler rules for small firms, higher stipend support, credit for workplace learning under the NCrF, and the PM Internship Scheme (2024), which places young people in large companies with a monthly stipend.

Education, skill and employment

Skill programmes have added trained workers in sectors such as retail, construction and logistics, but the link between education, skill and employment is weak at three points. The Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) shows unemployment among young people higher for those with more education, which points to a mismatch between what is taught and what is hired. Few workers have formal vocational training, since most learn on the job in the informal sector. And short courses under PMKVY have produced low placement rates where training was not tied to local demand.

Issues and way forward

• Quality and faculty. Vacant teaching posts and weak research in state universities limit quality. Funding linked to performance, faculty recruitment through transparent processes and the Research Foundation's focus on state universities can help.
• Mismatch. Curricula should be designed with industry, as sector skill councils already do for skilling, with compulsory internships in every degree.
• Low status of skills. Credit transfer under NCrF and pathways from vocational certificates into degrees can end the view of skilling as a second choice.
• Examination integrity. The Act punishes leaks after they happen; prevention needs secure computer based tests, encrypted paper logistics and audited service providers, as the committee under K. Radhakrishnan recommended for the National Testing Agency in 2024.
• Career guidance. Students choose courses with little information on jobs, so guidance in schools and public data on graduate outcomes by course would help.

Common confusions

• GER and net enrolment. GER counts all students enrolled as a share of the age group, even if they are older or younger; net enrolment counts only those within the age group.
• PMKVY and NAPS. PMKVY gives short training in a centre; NAPS supports learning on the job inside a firm.
• The 2024 Act and candidates. The Act targets organised leaks and those who run examinations; it is not mainly a law against individual candidates, whose misconduct is handled by the examining body.
• Skilling and vocational education. Vocational education is part of school and college curricula under NEP; skilling usually means short courses for youth and workers outside them.

For the exam

• Keyword bank: gross enrolment ratio, multidisciplinary university, Academic Bank of Credits, multiple entry and exit, Anusandhan National Research Foundation, Public Examinations Act 2024, organised paper leak, Skill India, PMKVY, apprenticeship, earn while you learn, National Credit Framework, recognition of prior learning, skill mismatch, demographic dividend.
• Practise the previous year questions on this topic →
• Use in an answer:
  • Introduction with data: "India's gross enrolment ratio in higher education was about 28.4 per cent in 2021 to 22, and NEP 2020 aims to raise it to 50 per cent by 2035."
  • Introduction with a report: "NEP 2020 aims to expose at least half of all learners to vocational education, so that skill is no longer the path left for those who failed in academics."
  • Conclusion: "Skilling succeeds when it is tied to real jobs, counted in the same credits as a degree, and learnt partly at the workplace."
  • Conclusion: "Expansion of higher education will yield a demographic dividend only if quality, fair examinations and links to work grow with it."