Kaushalya Vardhan Kendra (KVK)

Instead of trainees going to the Institutes, the Institutes go to the trainees :

• The very idea of "Kaushalya Vardhan Kendra" was conceived during the Chintan Shibir at Dhordo (Kutchh, Gujarat) held from 3rd December 2009 to 7th December 2009. The emphasis was also on the villages where the vocational training facilities were not initiated by the state Government.
• Courses were designed on the basis of participatory approach of Kaushalya Sabha in the villages with the Villages of the state having population above 5000 covered with Skill centers within 15 kms Cluster.
• 500 KVKs were established in 4 phases. 455 various courses have been acknowledged considering the local needs and another 1980 Life Skill courses are also added later on.

The courses were selected on WISH concept :

• W - Women Oriented Courses,
• I -Industry Oriented Courses,
• S -Soft Skill and Service Sector Related Courses,
• H -Hard Core Traditional Courses.
• Courses were selected on the basis of employment and self-employment opportunities available in the locality & cluster of villages.
• Nominal fees of Rs.50.00 per month are charged from General candidate and SC, ST, BPL, Physically Handicapped and Women are exempted from fees.
• Main breakthrough of the scheme is to increase the woman's turnout for skill-related courses. At each & every KVK there should be minimum 4 Courses and the Batch size of 20 trainees / course, there is an Employability Skill component in all the courses, 455 Short Term Courses - 40 hrs. to 576 hrs.

Trainees Training :

• Total 1302949 trainees have been trained, out of which 818936 were women, and the participation of women have been increased from 47% to 61%.
• All the 500 KVKs have DTH connections and the regular lectures have been arranged through "Bhaskaracharya Institute for Space Applications and Geo informatics"(BISAG).
• The development journey of Gujarat received another feather in its cap! Gujarat's Kaushalya Vardhan Kendra, the flagship scheme of the Directorate of Employment and Training to enhance skill development among the people has won the Prime Minister's Award for Excellence in Public Administration for the year 2011-2012.

Prime Minister Award:

• The award was presented by the Prime Minister Dr.Manmohan Singh on 21st April 2013, which is commemorated as National Civil Services Day. The Award was received by Ms.Sonal Mishra, Director Employment and Training.

Skill Training :

• These Institutes have been started to Impart the desired skill training at the door steps of the rural population, to rehabilitate school drop outs, adolescent girls and housewives and to skill & empower the rural youth.
• There is a flexible approach to harness the potential of rural youth and to impart training of hard and soft skills to meet the demand of regional and local industries also to promote the self-employment and entrepreneurship by multi skilling and to Increase employability through certification.
• Buildings of Gram and Taluka Panchayats, schools, colleges, rural market yards and private owners were acquired and converted into Kaushalya Vardhan Kendras (KVKs) with some additions and alterations.

Appriciation of KVK :

• These Institutes have been started to Impart the desired skill training at the door steps of the rural population, to rehabilitate school drop outs, adolescent girls and housewives and to skill & empower the rural youth.
• There is a flexible approach to harness the potential of rural youth and to impart training of hard and soft skills to meet the demand of regional and local industries also to promote the self-employment and entrepreneurship by multi skilling and to Increase employability through certification.
• Buildings of Gram and Taluka Panchayats, schools, colleges, rural market yards and private owners were acquired and converted into Kaushalya Vardhan Kendras (KVKs) with some additions and alterations.

Implementation of this scheme :

• The District level ITIs were designated as nodal agencies for the implementation of this scheme and the Principals of the Industrial Training Institutes were entrusted with the responsibilities of starting the KVKs and monitoring the training activities, these Principals of the Institutes were declared as Skill Development Officers for their particular District.
• Overall success of KVKs has created an impact to open up a new era and therefore it has been a path breaking venture to give new hopes to rural as well as urban people.
• By adopting a rural approach (i.e. Training facility at the door step and selecting trades popular amongst woman participants) this venture has gone a long way in bridging rural urban divide and in meeting aspirations and desire of quality skill education in rural area and disadvantaged section of society at par with urban.
• Scheme has also brought some changes in the quality of life in rural areas of the people as they have got access to the modern pattern of training and skill education facilities.