Life Long Skill Learning and Empowering Rural Women through Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikash Yojana: A Study

The fast changing postmodern societies demand people acquiring new knowledge, skills and training for better living. Lifelong learning aims to fill the gap between existing knowledge in a person and the one required to enable one to act meaning fully when the changing situation demands. As per census 2011, more than 70% of the rural female workforce is engaged in agriculture in principal subsidiary capacity are around 75% (NSSO, 2011) which are characterized by low earning, low productivity, poor working condition and lack of social protection. One of the key strategies of NMEW, 2010 in India is investment in skill and entrepreneurship development, micro credit, vocational training and SHG for economic empowerment of women. As the formal education sector is not enough for fulfilling the emerging needs of the rural women, it become imperative to provide lifelong skill training for empowering them. To know the relevance of life long skill learning in the area of Baihata Chariali, an effort was made to study the status of rural women who have undergone skill training under ?PMKVY?, (Prime Minister Kaushal Vikash Yojana?), but could not involve themselves in income generating activities for different reasons. In this study, an attempt is made to know the functioning of training providers, placement trend and follow up mechanism and the required skill gap in terms of life long skill learning framework. The objective of the paper is to know the challenges in employment generation after having training, relevance of lifelong skill training and to suggest means for providing lifelong skill training for empowering the rural women.