Govt approves Rs 436 crore to skill 412,000 professionals in new technology

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has approved Rs 436 crore over a period of three years for Future Skills PRIME, a joint venture between the government and National Association of Software and Services Companies.

The programme, the next level of the Future Skills platform, seeks to skill 412,000 professionals in new technology such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality, Internet of Things, Big Data, cybersecurity, social and mobile and so on.

Last year, Nasscom and the government, in a joint initiative announced the Future Skills portal for member companies in the IT-ITeS industry to reskill across nine emerging technologies. Of the 4.5 million people employed in the industry today, 1.5 - 2 million are expected to require reskilling in the next 4-5 years.

As many as 200,000 professionals have been trained on the platform so far.

This PRIME is the next phase of the Future Skills platform and is open to professionals from outside the IT industry as well, who want to skill themselves in ten emerging technologies. Among the other beneficiaries of the platform are 10,000 government officials and 2,000 trainers.

“States will have to factor in this kind of high end skilling of professionals as well,” said IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.

The courses are a mix of material developed by industry and academia. Several course materials are free, while more advanced courses are available for between Rs 6,000-70,000, depending on the kind of technology.