Bhubaneswar: To make youth future-ready by upskilling them with new-age technologies and various emerging trades, the State Government has come up with NUA Odisha scheme with a budgetary provision of Rs 385 crore for three years.
The Skill Development and Technical Education (SD&TE) Department has issued a notification on ‘Nutana Unnata Abhilasha’ (NUA) Odisha Scheme recently.
“Govt has formulated the Nutana Unnata Abhilasha (#NUAOdisha) scheme to make youth future-ready by upskilling them with new-age technologies and various emerging trades. Govt will spend Rs 385 Cr to skill one lakh youth in emerging trades annually over the next three years,” Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) said in X, formerly twitter.
It will be implemented by the directorates of employment, technical education & training and the World Skill Centre (WSC). The scheme will leverage existing and new skilling institutions and partnerships with industries to deliver training, sources said.
Skill Development and Technical Education Department Principal Secretary Usha Padhee said in the notification that the programme will work towards addressing the scarcity of skilled human resources in emerging trades by offering high-quality training, fostering industry linkage and enhancing employability skills.
It will also help bridge the skill gap in the utilisation of new-age technologies in traditional sectors like handicrafts, handloom, agriculture and others, she said.
The scheme has been designed to cater to a wide range of beneficiaries ranging from school dropouts and engineering graduates to postgraduates through various offerings, including fresh skilling for youths, employability skills for students in various institutions.
Under the visionary leadership of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, Government ITIs are instrumental in shaping the Skilled on Odisha brand. These ITIs are driving #transformation among youth, turning them into a skilled workforce, supporting industrial growth & boosting income generation, the source said.
The scheme was announced by the then Finance Minister Niranjan Pujari during the annual budget speech for the year 2023-24.
Building on the success stories in skill development, Odisha would be focusing now on new age emerging technologies to create an opportunity for the youth to make them a formidable skilled workforce of the world who will ultimately be the face of new Odisha, the Minister had said.
“I am extremely pleased to announce that one lakh youth would be trained in future technologies like Cloud Computing, Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality-Virtual Reality, Data Science, 3D printing etc.,” he stated.
An amount of Rs100 crore has been earmarked for this new scheme NUA Odisha (Nutana Unnata Abhilasha) to be utilized in a time bound manner in the current year.