Focus on creating jobs, skill training in budget

The Narendra Modi government on Saturday substantially increased its fund allocations for skill trainings and livelihood programmes in the Union Budget 2025-26 as part of its ambitious target of having 100% skilled labour with meaningful employment in the country.

- Saubhadra Chatterji

NEW DELHI:

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman's eighth budget focussed on employment generation and skill development as key areas—themes that also dominated her previous budgets. The minister announced a slew of schemes to boost employment; as a consequence, the skill development ministry's annual budget, particularly the revenue expenses of its skill programmes, saw a manifold rise.

The main allocation was made on upgrading ITIs or Industrial Training Institutes that started in the 1950s to give vocational training to young people and help create a skilled workforce.

From a mere ₹294 crore in the revised estimates of FY25, the "new ITI upgradation" programme was allocated ₹3,000 crore in the 2025 budget, signalling the government's urgency to impart skill education to a large section of the young population and reap the dividend of India's youth power.

Sitharaman also announced five National Centres of Excellence.