Apprenticeship Amendment Bill gets Rajya Sabha nod

NEW DELHI: In a major boost to the government’s labour reforms and skill development initiatives, the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday passed the Apprenticeship Amendment Bill with a voice vote, paying way for industry to take on the task of imparting skills to millions of youth entering the labour workforce every year without much fear. The bill, which has already been passed in the Lok Sabha during the last session, will now go for the assent of the President after which the proposed amendments would be notified.

The key changes introduced by the NDA government under the amendments proposed to the Apprenticeship Act include dropping the clause that mandates imprisonment of company directors that fail to implement the provisions of the Apprenticeship Act of 1961.

It has also decided to do away with an amendment proposed by the UPA mandating employers to absorb at least half of its apprentices in regular jobs as it had triggered strong objections from industry chambers, the Planning Commission and the human resources development ministry, which is in charge of training technical and graduate apprentices.

The previous government had also toyed with the idea of bringing a new law altogether, instead of amending the old law. It had tasked the then Skills Advisor to the PM, S Ramadorai, to draft it. In 2013-14, just 2.11 lakh apprentices were appointed in industry out of a potential identified capacity of 3.6 lakh seats — numbers that are miniscule for aworkforce that is now growing by 12 million a year with most of them having no employable skills.

To put that in perspective, Germany has 3 million, Japan 10 million and China has 20 million apprentices who pick up critical employment skills through a hands-on approach.