The Gap between Knowledge and Skill
Published on : Monday 06-09-2021
Celebrating Independence Day on August 15 this year, India has entered the 75th year of independence with various events and programmes slated to be held over the next 12 months to culminate in a grand celebration on August 15, 2022.
While the country has achieved a lot on most parameters of developments – agriculture, industry, science and technology – much more remains to be achieved to join the ranks of the developed countries and match their per capita income levels. One of the most important developments of recent years is the digital revolution that has swept the world where India greatly benefitted thanks to the democratisation of technology, as more and more people have gained access to a level playing field. It is this digital revolution that has blunted the severity of the unprecedented pandemic to hit humanity in a hundred years to a great extent.
However, if India has to truly find its place in the ranks of the developed nations, one of the most important things to do is to bridge the gap between knowledge and skill. India is not just one of the most populous nations of the world with 1.3 billion people. The fact that 62% of this humongous population is in the working age group, and a good 54% aged below 25, is a huge advantage. While finding employment to this swelling number of young persons joining the job market is a challenge when the economy is not growing at the desired pace, the bigger problem is not unemployment but the fact that a large percentage of those entering the job market are unemployable.
This is precisely the reason the Government of India has initiated various skill development initiatives under the Skill India programme. Even more ambitious is the New Education Policy unveiled recently which addresses many of the drawbacks of the present system and seeks to factor in skill development in the regular curriculum. The pace of digital transformation in general, and in industry in particular, depends largely on skills of the workforce at the entry level. While automation is often blamed for taking away jobs, the fact remains that many vacancies exist today in industry due to paucity of candidates with the requisite skills.
This Cover Story of this edition of Industrial Automation is The Sensor Revolution – How sensors are revolutionising everything. Successful digital transformation is all about making the correct decisions every time. Sensor technology in general, Smart Sensors in particular, capture the minutest data, monitor the slightest changes across various parameters, adding precision and accuracy in digital decision making. The cover story has experts putting forth their views on the subject, presenting an overview of the current trends.
