Presiding over the 1st meeting of General Council of the Society (DSMS) Delhi’s Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit called upon to include migratory workers in modus operandi of the mission which would provide skill development training to pass-out school students, unemployed youth, school drop-outs and informal sector workers & facilitate certification of skills acquired informally. It would also strive hard to bridge the gap between industry demand and number of skilled personnel.

The Chief Minister is Chairman of the General Council whereas five of her cabinet colleagues, Chief Secretary, Pr. Secretary to CM, a number of Pr. Secretaries, secretaries, Police Commissioner, VC (DDA), Chairman (DDA) are members of the 21-member Council.

The society will ensure time-bound training to the targeted number of high quality skilled personnel, across the strata of society and among the disadvantaged sections. It would also grant accreditation to skilled training institutes, providers and instructors. The Governing Council would give overall policy direction and guidance for skilled development, suggestions and convergence between programmes and schemes of other departments and promote convergence of various schemes related to skilled development. It would bring all the departments and other Government agencies conducting such skill and vocational training programmes under the umbrella of the DSMS. This would also ensure that the supply of skills training is in tune with market demand for skills.

The DSMS would be a five-year long initiative, focusing on upgrading the skills of youth (drop out of school), informal sector workers and other weaker sections of the Delhi’s Society. The mission would draw upon partnerships from a range of institutions in the public and private sectors. Public Private Partnership (PPP) and encouraging private players to start skills development facilities would be an integral part of the skills mission.

There would be a 15-member executive council headed by the Chief Secretary to take all decisions. The mission would also try to create an atmosphere conducive to shift focus from formal education to vocational education. The CII has offered all possible assistance and cooperation to make efforts of DSMS more purposeful and fruitful.

After expansion of cable TV network, FM radio and IPTV , centre is considering a policy to introduce mobile TV service. Though the technology is already there in the country but the government is working on a policy to provide mobile TV service. According to Ministry of Information and Broadcasting a suitable regulatory framework for enabling the private players to provide mobile TV service is under consideration. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has already recommended opening of terresterial transmission root only for provisioning of mobile TV service.

At present, there are 394 sattelite TV channels in the country while their number was just one in 2000. The number of private FM radio stations were 248 till the end of last financial year. According to annual report released by the Ministry of I&B today ‘a technology neutral approach’ has been suggested for the allocation of ‘mobile TV’. The pattern will be on the same line as prescribed for allocation of FM radio. There are requirement for the payment of one time entry fee, the annual license fee and timeframe for discharging the roll out obligations. A state or group of smaller states is proposed to define a license area and the license is proposed to be given for a period of 10 year with a provision of renewal. The cross holding limits has been recommended to the extent of 20% equity share. between the broadcasting companies and the Mobile TV licensee. It is notable that the tecnology to view TV channels on mobile is already in the market but in the absence of proper policy in this regard it could not become a popular reality. Though no timeframe has been setup to implement the policy.

The ministry is also in the process of finalising a policy of Sattelite Radio Services. The government had sent the draft policy to TRAI for its comment to issue license for non-news and current affairs radio news. TRAI has sent its recommendations in this regard to the Ministry. The recommendations are under consideration of the government.

S.K. Sharma, who served as Secretary, Delhi Vidhan Sabha during 1993 to 2002, has infact, compiled his experiences & observations in his book. There is also reference to those incidents, which took place behind the scene and remained unknown till now.
The book provides wide information on the issue of statehood for the capital city. It also include views on the need of full statehood-its pros and cons, translation of business rules, limitations and eagerness of new legislatures, how to become an impressive legislature and legislative & Parliamentary terminology.

Delhi got its first Vidhan Sabha under 1993 in its present administrative set up. Fourth assembly was constituted in December 2008. Sharma has compiled all information about the members of all four assemblies with their social, educational and economic background and age. He has also analyzed their legislative experience, number of women MLA’s etc.

The annexure of the book are, infact, comprehensive reference material. The annexure carries all bills –debated and lapsed and resolutions-passed and presented on the issue of statehood.

Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit has presented a brief introduction of the book in her short article. According to her Sharma was instrumental in framing Rules & Regulations and procedures of the functioning of the legislative assembly during its early years. The book would prove to be helpful and informative to all present and would be legislatives. The speaker Delhi Vidhan Sabha Dr. Yoganand Shastri has written a foreward of the book. He has described the effort of Sharma as first ever study on the subject.

Students, who appeared in their class-X and Class-XII and are not willing to pursue further education will get professional training in the capital city

The training will be provided under Prime Minister’s Skill Development Mission Programme, Delhi’s Education Minister Arvinder Singh Lovely said today in an interaction with media at Delhi Secretariat. All arrangements have been made to impart training to around 30,000 students who would be able to find a respectable employment, he said adding that the classes in afternoon would be held in all single shift government schools in Delhi.  This would provide a unique opportunity to the students for enhancing their employability if they do not wish to pursue higher studies.  The Directorate of Education has lined up all competent trainers for this purpose. 

 A part of trainers would, of course, be arranged from outside faculty.  The Modular Employable Skills (MES) short-term courses are demand driven as determined in consultation with the industry.  The objective is to improve their employability by optimally utilizing the infrastructure available in government schools.  The courses are optional for the students.  The duration for these trades varies from 80 to 270 hours depending on the nature of the trade.  The Directorate of Education is expecting that around 30,000 students would enroll and avail the benefit of these courses. 

The trades being offered are automobile repair, beauty culture & hair dressing, electrical, electronics, fashion designing and garment making, Indian foods and snacks, hospitality, information and communication technology, refrigeration and air-conditioning, travel & tourism, retail sector, security and media.

Education Minister stated that training courses are being offered after successful trial under which around 4000 students in the schools have been imparted training.  All arrangements have been ensured based on the feedback received from these trial courses however the courses would be further fine tuned when they are introduced in government schools of Directorate of Education in mid July, 2009. 

Singh expressed confidence that this scheme would prove to be beneficial to large number of students belonging to weaker and other middle-income families.  The trained professional would be able to serve the needs of society at large.  The government has taken a step which would go a long way in making those students professionally qualified and competent enough to earn their earning in a respectable manner who are not in a position to pursue further study. Singh added that the training by qualified trainers would make trainees an asset in their self making them a useful component of the society