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India’s education system faces a growing employability gap as curricula lag industry needs. The article highlights skill shortages, limited industry exposure and faculty preparedness, and calls for curriculum reform, vocational education and upskilling.

Indian education system is passing through a delicate phase. With structure and processes not keeping pace with the international quality norms and growing divergence emanating from the concepts of access and quality, it is struggling despite the recommendations of NEP 2020. One of the crucial issues in recent times is the emerging debate on education and its impact on employability.

The issue has always been discussed in academic circles. But with around 65 per cent of Indian population (around 95 crores) below the age of 35 and with median age of about 29 years, India today is a land of young people and therefore, there is a growing need of employment alignment.

If one looks at the basic statistics, the situation calls for a quick solution. With more than 1.04 crores students coming out of graduation courses (as per AISHE reports) alone and around 1.5 crore to 2.0 crores of people added to the workforce each year, the question is whether the country can afford to create so many suitable and appropriate jobs in a year. The problem gets more serious with unemployed people from previous years.

With government departments / public sector units jobs getting dried up and AI replacing many traditional jobs, the situation does not seem to be happy. Even the recent report of NITI Aayog report has flagged off an alarming situation with around 8.7 crore young people (15-29 years age) being classified as NEET (neither in education, employment, or training).