Ola signs MoU with NSDC; to invest Rs. 100 crore towards skill development

Taxi aggregator Ola on Monday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to train, skill development and empower 100,000 driver partners in the next three years.

The joint project will involve Ola and NSDC identifying people from various section of the society and skilling them to become driver entrepreneurs. Ola aims at investing Rs. 100 crore in adding 100,000 drivers to its platform.

This is part of Ola's larger vision of adding 50 lakh drivers over the next five years. The MoU was signed by Bhavish Aggarwal, CEO and Co-founder, Ola and Manish Kumar, MD and CEO, NSDC in the presence of Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Union Minister of State Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Murli Manohar Joshi, Member of Parliament, Kanpur, UP, Ram Naik, Governor, Uttar Pradesh, Devendra Singh, Member of Parliament, Akbarpur, UP.

"We are extremely excited to partner with NSDC to invest in the training and skilling of drivers as this would help us in realizing our larger goal to skill 50 lakh drivers in the next five years while contributing towards our mission of building mobility for a billion Indians," said CEO and Co-Founder Ola, Bhavish Aggarwal.

"We are extremely happy to work alongside Ola, driving this campaign that has the potential to significantly improve livelihoods and contribute to the economic growth of lakhs of Indians. Such initiatives will go a long way in promoting skill development and creating an environment of entrepreneurship for the people of the country," said MD and CEO NSDC, Manish Kumar.

"We are immensely proud to participate in this initiative. Together with NSDC, and Ola we will be able to enhance the capacities of driving training programmes effectively enabling economic development for lakhs of people in the country. This is a one of a kind campaign that will not only contribute to the Prime Minister's Skill India Mission, but also create a robust skill ecosystem for the youth," said CEO Rise India, Ajay Chhangani.

Ola has partnered with leading Indian financial institutions and car manufacturers to give the driver partner community easy access to capital, insurance and vehicles at discounted prices. Over the last five years, Ola has been successful in on-boarding over 5.5 lakh skilled driver-partners onto its platform.

It recently launched India's first state-of-the-art dedicated training center for drivers in partnership with Rise India and NSDC at Chapra, Bihar.