Pallavi Jha, Chairperson & MD, Walchand PeopleFirst and Dale Carnegie India

Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], February 8:  The FY25 Union Budget focuses ambitiously on energy, skilling, and employment, with a ₹500 crore allocation for Centres of Excellence to address rising unemployment. However, this funding remains insufficient to meet the needs of India’s large demographic dividend. The sluggish uptake of existing programs like the PM Internship Scheme highlights the critical need for structural reforms to drive implementation and quality assurance and prevent creating another layer of mediocre training providers. While the focus on agriculture and manufacturing aligns with India’s long-term growth imperatives, these interventions risk becoming short-term electoral gestures rather than solutions to deep-rooted structural challenges.