Women Are Second to None in India's Skill-Building Vision: Jayant Chaudhary's Case

The Lift Line

India can train a million more women as welders and electricians. Whether that number ever shows up in a pay slip depends on decisions this training statistic does not measure at all.

Why This Editorial Matters for Your Exam

This editorial supplies a precise, exam-grade correction to a lazy reading of skilling statistics: it is not enough to know that women are roughly 12-13 per cent of all ITI enrolment nationally, the testable fact is that their share collapses to under 5 per cent in the specific core engineering trades, electrician, welder, fitter, mechanic, that carry the higher wages and better employment linkages. It also supplies the transferable analytical move examiners reward: distinguishing a supply-side intervention (more training seats) from a demand-side and enabling-environment intervention (jobs that actually absorb the trained, safe and accessible workplaces), a distinction that recurs across GS2 welfare-scheme questions and GS3 labour-economy questions alike.

GS Paper 2: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to women’'s empowerment; welfare schemes for women; government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

GS Paper 3: Inclusive growth and issues arising from it; employment; mobilisation of resources; effects of liberalisation on the economy.

Background and Context

India’‘s Female Labour Force Participation Rate (FLFPR), as measured by the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), has risen from 23.3 per cent in 2017-18 to 41.7 per cent in 2023-24, a rise the government has cited as evidence of genuine progress. But the aggregate number conceals an important structural detail: rural FLFPR reached 47.6 per cent in 2023-24 while urban FLFPR stood at only 25.4 per cent, meaning much of the reported gain reflects women’s self-employment and unpaid or semi-formal work in agriculture and allied rural activity rather than a broad-based movement of women into skilled, wage-earning, urban or industrial jobs. The Ministry of Labour and Employment has set a stated aspiration of raising FLFPR further, toward the mid-50s per cent range by around 2030, a target the minister’'s op-ed implicitly invokes when it frames skilling as the lever to get there.

The Industrial Training Institute (ITI) system, regulated jointly by the Directorate General of Training (DGT) under the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) and the National Council for Vocational Education and Training (NCVET), is the backbone of India’s formal vocational training architecture, running the Craftsmen Training Scheme across trades ranging from electrician and welding to fashion design and healthcare support. The network has expanded substantially, from roughly 9,800 ITIs in 2014 to over 14,500-15,000 by 2025-26, part of the broader Skill India Mission launched in 2015 and now marking over a decade of operation. Within this expanded network, government data covering 2019 to 2024 shows women made up about 12.65 per cent of total ITI enrolment (roughly 5.67 lakh of 44.79 lakh candidates), a figure broadly consistent with what the minister’s op-ed cites. The sharper, less publicised statistic is trade-wise: women’s share falls to roughly 4.8 per cent in Electrician, 3.5 per cent in Welder, 3.4 per cent in Fitter, 2.9 per cent in Plumber and 2.7 per cent in Mechanic (Motor Vehicle), an overall engineering-trades average of under 4 per cent, while women are disproportionately concentrated in trades such as dress designing, cosmetology, secretarial practice and healthcare-support courses.

The op-ed itself, and what is genuinely its author’s own framing. This piece is a signed op-ed by Jayant Chaudhary, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, not an unsigned Hindustan Times editorial. He opens with the Latin phrase “a posse ad esse” (moving from possibility to reality) to describe how societies build human capital, and times the piece around International Youth Day (12 August) and this year’s World Youth Skills Day (15 July) theme, “Skills for a Shared Future,” which calls for action “across lines of gender, geography, and socio-economic realities.” His own cited enrolment figures are rounder than the government dataset above, “of nearly 45 lakh Indians enrolled between 2019 and 2024, only 12% were women”, and he attributes the trade-wise breakdown specifically to the NCVT’s Rapid Analysis, citing electrician at 4.8%, welder at 3.5%, and motor vehicle courses at 2.7%, figures that independently corroborate Ujiyari’s own trade-wise research above. On the macro indicator, Chaudhary cites the PLFS placing FLFPR at “40%,” and offers his own single-target estimate: if participation rises to 54% by 2030, India “can add $1.4 trillion to its GDP while ensuring more inclusive growth.” He also names NAVYA (Nurturing Aspirations through Vocational Training for Young Adolescent Girls) as a specific scheme initiative addressing the gap, alongside his broader argument that skilling’s purpose is not “merely immediate employment or entrepreneurship,” but the “pursuit of lifelong learning” in an economy that “demands individuals who understand how to continually build, unlearn and reskill.”

The Analysis

1. The headline 12-13 per cent figure and the trade-wise 3-5 per cent figure are both true, and both matter for different reasons. The op-ed’s framing, that women are “just about” a small share of trades like electrician, welding and mechanic, is precise: those specific core engineering trades sit well below the overall ITI average, meaning the gender gap the minister is highlighting is real and, on the evidence, understated rather than overstated.

2. The economic case rests on serious but methodologically varied estimates, and precision claims should be treated cautiously. A Centre for Social and Economic Progress (CSEP) study estimates India could add somewhere between roughly 700 billion and 1.4 trillion dollars to GDP by closing gender gaps in workforce participation, with the higher figure specifically tied to shifting women into higher-productivity, non-farm employment rather than any employment at all. Earlier McKinsey Global Institute research produced different figures for different target years and scenarios. The precise “1.4 trillion” number the op-ed cites should therefore be read as a plausible upper-bound estimate from one credible study, not a single settled forecast every economist agrees on.

3. Skill India’s women-specific provisions so far are mostly support mechanisms, not sorting interventions. PMKVY 4.0’s Common Cost Norms extend boarding, lodging and transport support to women trainees and other special groups; working women’s hostel schemes and revised National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme (NAPS) stipends add further support. These measures help women who have already chosen to enrol stay enrolled, but none of them directly targets the deeper pattern this editorial identifies, why women are counselled toward cosmetology and secretarial trades rather than electrician and welding in the first place, a gap flagged explicitly in NITI Aayog’s own recent analysis of women’s participation in non-traditional livelihoods.

4. The demand side is the harder, less-discussed half of the problem. Training more women as electricians or welders only raises FLFPR if employers, construction firms, manufacturing units, public-sector utilities, actually hire and retain them, in workplaces that are physically safe and where the POSH Act, 2013 is meaningfully enforced, not just formally adopted. India’s own precedent, persistently higher female graduate unemployment despite rising female enrolment in higher education, is a direct warning that rising trained supply does not automatically convert into rising paid employment.

5. Wage and mobility outcomes differ sharply by trade, which is precisely why the sorting pattern matters economically, not just symbolically. Core engineering trades like electrician and welding typically offer higher entry wages, more unionised protection, and clearer progression into contracting or supervisory roles than trades like cosmetology or secretarial practice; a policy that raises overall women’s ITI enrolment without shifting the trade-wise distribution risks widening, not narrowing, the gender pay gap even as headline participation numbers improve.

6. The Mission Shakti and skilling policy architectures need to be read together, not separately. Women’s safety, childcare and hostel infrastructure sit institutionally under the Ministry of Women and Child Development’s Mission Shakti umbrella, while skilling sits under MSDE; the editorial’s underlying argument, that structural barriers like childcare and workplace safety are as important as training seats, is really an argument for tighter convergence between these two ministries’ delivery mechanisms at the district level, not a case either can fully address alone.

Data and Institutions Vault

Prelims-grade facts:

• FLFPR (PLFS): 23.3% (2017-18) rose to 41.7% (2023-24); rural 47.6%, urban 25.4% (2023-24)
• ITI network: roughly 9,800 (2014) to 14,500-15,000+ (2025-26)
• Women’s overall ITI enrolment share (2019-2024): roughly 12.65% (about 5.67 lakh of 44.79 lakh candidates)
• Women’s share in core engineering trades: Electrician ~4.8%, Welder ~3.5%, Fitter ~3.4%, Plumber ~2.9%, Mechanic (Motor Vehicle) ~2.7%; overall engineering-trades average under 4%
• Regulatory architecture: Directorate General of Training (DGT) and National Council for Vocational Education and Training (NCVET) under MSDE; Craftsmen Training Scheme governs ITIs
• Skill India Mission: launched 2015; PMKVY now in its 4.0 version; NAPS governs apprenticeship stipends
• Estimated GDP gain from closing the female workforce gap: roughly 700 billion to 1.4 trillion dollars (Centre for Social and Economic Progress study); treat as a range, not a fixed figure
• POSH Act: Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013
• Author: Jayant Chaudhary, Union MoS (Independent Charge), Skill Development and Entrepreneurship; op-ed timed to International Youth Day (12 August) and World Youth Skills Day (15 July), theme “Skills for a Shared Future”
• Minister’s own cited figures: ~45 lakh ITI enrolments (2019-2024), 12% women (rounder than the 12.65% government dataset figure above); trade-wise data attributed to NCVT Rapid Analysis (electrician 4.8%, welder 3.5%, motor vehicle 2.7%); FLFPR cited at “40%” (PLFS); target: 54% FLFPR by 2030 could add $1.4 trillion to GDP
• Named scheme: NAVYA (Nurturing Aspirations through Vocational Training for Young Adolescent Girls)

Watch the trap: an aggregate “women are X per cent of ITI enrolment” figure can look reassuring while the trade-wise distribution remains heavily skewed. Prelims and Mains answers should specify which figure, overall enrolment or trade-wise enrolment, is being cited, since they tell very different stories.

The Debate

Argument FOR treating skilling expansion as the right first lever. Training is a necessary precondition, women cannot enter electrician or welding jobs without the qualification an ITI or apprenticeship confers, and the specific support measures now in place, PMKVY 4.0 boarding and transport norms, working women’s hostels, revised NAPS stipends, directly address some of the practical barriers, distance, cost, safety of commute, that have historically kept women out of these trades. Expanding the pipeline is a legitimate, measurable first step and one within a skill ministry’s direct policy reach.

Argument AGAINST treating enrolment growth as sufficient on its own. Supply-side interventions cannot fix a demand-side or enabling-environment problem. If employers do not hire women into core trades at the same rate as men, if workplace safety enforcement remains weak, and if childcare infrastructure near industrial and construction worksites stays absent, a larger pool of women with ITI certificates in electrician or welding will not translate into a materially higher FLFPR, it will translate into a larger pool of certified-but-unemployed or underemployed women, a pattern India has already lived through with female graduate unemployment.

Balanced verdict. Both readings are correct about different halves of the same problem. Skilling supply expansion is necessary and the minister’s op-ed is right to flag the stark trade-wise gender gap, but it is not sufficient, and the op-ed itself acknowledges structural barriers like childcare and workplace safety without yet detailing the enforcement mechanisms that would close them. The credible policy test for the next few years is not whether women’s ITI enrolment percentage rises, it likely will, but whether their share within the highest-wage core trades rises alongside it, and whether that translates into measurable employment and retention, not just training completion.

How to Think About This

The transferable pattern: when a labour-market gap is framed as a training or skilling deficit, always check whether the real constraint sits on the supply side (not enough trained people), the demand side (not enough jobs willing to absorb them), or the enabling environment (conditions like safety, childcare or transport that determine whether trained people can actually take and keep those jobs). A scheme that expands supply without addressing demand or the enabling environment will show up as a good enrolment statistic and a disappointing employment statistic.

This distinction recurs across Indian policy debates well beyond skilling. Engineering and medical graduate unemployment, discussed for years in India, reflects a supply of qualified people outpacing demand-side job creation in matching sectors. Financial inclusion schemes with high bank-account-opening rates but low active-usage rates reflect a similar gap between access (supply) and actual, sustained use (demand and enabling environment, in that case digital literacy and nearby banking infrastructure). And India’s own MGNREGA employment guarantee, unlike a training scheme, works precisely because it directly creates demand-side employment rather than merely building supply-side capacity, which is one reason its participation numbers translate more directly into paid work-days than skilling enrolment numbers translate into jobs. The general lesson for any labour or welfare-scheme answer: identify which side of the market a policy actually operates on before crediting it with an outcome that depends on the other side too.

Diagram-in-Words

Takeaway Box

Lift line for an answer:

A training certificate proves a woman can do the job. It does not prove anyone will hire her to do it, or that the workplace will be safe if they do.

Prelims hooks: FLFPR 23.3% (2017-18) to 41.7% (2023-24), rural 47.6% vs urban 25.4%; ITI network 9,800 (2014) to 14,500-15,000+ (2025-26); women’s ITI enrolment ~12.65% overall vs under 4% in core engineering trades; DGT, NCVET, MSDE; PMKVY 4.0, NAPS; POSH Act, 2013; CSEP GDP-gap estimate 700 billion to 1.4 trillion dollars.

Ethics and interview angle: when a skilling scheme’s headline success metric is enrolment rather than employment or retention, does the state have an ethical duty to disclose the narrower, less flattering trade-wise and outcome data alongside the aggregate figure, so that public confidence in the scheme is built on the full picture rather than the most convenient one?

PYQ linkage: UPSC has repeatedly tested women’s workforce participation, Skill India Mission components and labour-market indicators (FLFPR, worker population ratio); this editorial supplies the sharper supply-versus-demand analytical frame examiners reward, useful for GS2 women’s empowerment answers, GS3 employment and inclusive-growth answers, and Essay-paper material on gender and economic growth.

Probable question: “Rising enrolment of women in vocational training is often mistaken for rising women’s employment.” Examine this distinction with reference to India’s ITI system and the Skill India Mission.

Cross-reference: connects directly to any GS2/GS3 coverage of MGNREGA and demand-driven employment guarantees, and to Mission Shakti’s childcare and safety infrastructure, both useful comparison points for the supply-versus-demand argument developed here.

Sources: Hindustan Times, “Women are second to none in India’s skill-building vision” by Jayant Chaudhary, Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, PIB

Source: Women Are Second to None in India's Skill-Building Vision: Jayant Chaudhary's Case — Ujiyari.com | Free UPSC & State PCS Editorial Analysis