Foreign language skills for youth now

Staff Reporter

Guwahati, March 28: The State government seems to be trying to give skill development a new orientation. Until now the government has been preoccupied with imparting skills such as driving, software and hardware repair, tailoring, carpentry, electrical works etc, but now it would lay stress on language skills too. State Industry and Skill Development Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary gave its indication in the State Assembly on Wednesday.

“We’re now going to lay stress on knowledge of foreign languages, with thrust on Asian countries, so that our youth can also go to there for employment. We’ll train them in such languages at our skill development centres. We’ll first start with Japanese language. We’ve already set up 496 skill development centres in the State with NGO involvement. In Mangaldai, a skill development city will come up at the cost of Rs 700 crore. We’ve also requested Numaligarh Refinery, Guwahati Refinery and Bongaigaon Thermal Power Station to take part in the magement of the Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) in their areas,” said Patowary.

The skill development city at Magaldai will train youth in 89 different areas, the minister said, adding the government has decided to train 60,000 youth through skill development centres and the target for the next year is 1,50,000 youth.