Budget emphasises skill development; proposes National Recruitment Agency

New Delhi: With a debilitating economy at hand and a rising unemployment problem, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman promised a lot for the youth in the Union Budget 2020-21, which included a Rs 99,300 crore allocation for the education sector, of which Rs 3,000 crore has been set aside for Skills Development schemes. The Budget showed that the government has decided to focus on enhancing the entrepreneurial capabilities of the youth in the country to address the problem of continued unemployment.

The government's thinking was based on the 2011 census, which predicted a 34.33 per cent youth population in India by 2020 and has accordingly made provisions for a National Recruitment Agency (NRA), apprenticeship embedded courses, urban local body internships for fresh engineers and a National Police Academy and National Forensic Science University along with other measures.

In what was the longest Budget speech, FM Sitharaman said that the NRA would be set up for recruiting in non-gazetted posts and explained: "At present, candidates have to appear for multiple examinations conducted by multiple agencies at different points of time, for similar posts. This places enormous burden on time, effort and cost of young people."

As for entrepreneurship, the government has proposed an investment clearance cell for entrepreneurs to exchange pre-investment advisories, information on land banks and facilitate clearances.

The focus of this Budget has hovered around skills development among youth and has proposed apprenticeship-reliant degree or diploma courses in 150 higher educational institutes by March 2021. In addition, the government has proposed special bridging courses for nurses and paramedical staff to boost their employability. The government has also planned to encourage large hospitals to provide Diplomat of National

Board/ Fellowship of National Board (DNB/FNB) courses under the National Board of Examinations to resident doctors.

Moreover, the Budget has proposed expansive measures to pour resources into financing education infrastructure in the country. The Finance Minister has said that External Commercial Borrowings and Foreign investment for such financing will be explored. In addition to announcing a National Police Academy and a National Forensic Science University, the Budget proposes up to degree-level online education for students from deprived sections of the society and students without access to higher education.

And of course, the much-awaited move of opening up India to foreign students was concretised in the Budget, which proposed conducting an entrance test called Ind-SAT (India — Standardised Aptitude Test) in Asian and African countries for students who wish to study in Indian higher education institutes.