【Co-hosted Seminar with CSAS】：Dr. Trent Brown, ‘Skill India in the Countryside: Expectations, Disappointments, and Possibilities’
Date: 19th May, 2023 (Friday)
Time: 18:00-19:30 (JST)
Format: High-flex (in person / zoom)
Venue: Room 407, Building 14, Komaba ⅠCampus, The University of Tokyo
Registration deadline: 16th May, 2023 (Wednesday)
*Registration is required only for online participants.
*We will inform resistrants of zoom URL on 17th May.
Lecturers:Dr. Trent Brown（Tokyo College, The University of Tokyo) ‘Skill India in the Countryside: Expectations, Disappointments, and Possibilities’
Abstract:
The Skill India initiative has aimed to dramatically upscale and reform India’s skill development sector, both to boost economic productivity and address chronic problems of unemployment and social exclusion. Available evidence, however, suggests rather disappointing outcomes from the initiative, both in terms of macro-level policy objectives and its micro-level impacts on people’s lives. Research in the social sciences, for example, suggests those who have undertaken training as part of Skill India’s new training programs have gained access to only entry level jobs with limited prospects for upward career mobility.
In this presentation, Trent Brown will present his research findings on the impacts of recently introduced skill trainings within the agricultural sector. His research shows that irrespective of the quality of training imparted, many trainees are not able to utilise the skills they gained in desired ways due to local social and institutional constraints. Moreover, while trainees came to expect that obtaining certified skills through Skill India training programs would facilitate access to financial benefits (such as loans from banks and government subsidies), this rarely eventuated, leading to feelings of disappointment and, in some cases, significant financial losses. Yet, the research also shows how trainees appropriate skills in novel ways for the empowerment of themselves and others, using them to challenge restrictive social norms and explore new ways of relating to their social and ecological environments.
Co-organizer: Center for South Asian Studies (CSAS); Indian Ocean World Studies (TINDOWS), The University of Tokyo; South Asia Studies Center, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies