Congress’s promise to apprenticeship is to provide skilling, dignity and employability to the youth

New Delhi: Congress’s promise to mandate apprenticeship with a stipend as a right “is about providing skilling, dignity and employability” to the youth rather than just giving them some money in the form of unemployment allowance.

The inclusion of the idea of a Right to Apprenticeship Act in its guarantees ahead of the Lok Sabha elections came after former finance minister and Congress Manifesto Committee Chairperson P Chidambaram and All India Professional Congress Head Praveen Chakravarty held consultations with experts across the world in the past month.

On Thursday, Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge and Rahul Gandhi unveiled five guarantees for the youth at a rally in Rajasthan, including a new Right to Apprenticeship Act to provide a one-year apprenticeship with a private or a public sector company to every diploma holder or college graduate below the age of 25. Apprentices will get Rs 1 lakh a year or Rs 8,500 a month.

This and other guarantees announced during Rahul’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra will be part of the party’s manifesto, which will be publicised after the Congress Working Committee clears it.

Chakravarti, who is also a member of the Manifesto Committee, said that the youth are the future, but they are the ones who are feeling the “most hopeless”.

“Right to Apprenticeship is almost like a right to a skill or a job. This is the first time someone is talking about legally guaranteeing it. This is not like unemployment allowance. It is about skilling, dignity and employability,” Chakravarty told DH.

As per the Congress's plan, any youth could demand an apprenticeship and they should get the internship for one year. The cost of apprenticeship will be shared by the government and employer, Chakravarty said while emphasising that the small businesses were emphatic about the scheme as it gives them labour where the cost is shared by the government.

He said that extensive consultations were held with economists, policy makers and business people, including a large number from the MSME sector.

Asked whether it would mean that they are providing an assured income to youth, Chakravarty said that the idea is much beyond this and if their intention was that, then they could have just offered some cash. "Here it is about skilling and employability," he added.

Besides the Right to Apprenticeship Act, the Congress has also promised to fill the existing 30 lakh vacancies in the Union government, a stringent law against paper leaks, social security law for gig workers and funding for start-ups.

On being asked how the Congress's promise on tackling the question paper leaks would improve the existing legal framework, Chakravarty said that the Congress will promise a monetary compensation for the victims.