State’s first HRD centre in cold storage

Mangalore Today News Network

Mangaluru:  The then labour minister B N Bachegowda inaugurated Karnataka state’s first Human Resource Development (HRD) centre in 2009, it had become pride of the city. The second largest centre after Bengaluru had achieved 23 per cent overall growth rate for the year 2013-14. Believe it or not, the centre which stretched helping hand to thousands, itself is in a ’thrishanku-swarga’ for at least one year now.

The order of Karnataka Vocational Training and Skill Development Corporation (KVTSDC) had discontinued activity ’temporarily’ from June 1, 2014. Only employment exchange activities seem to be going on. In fact the centre has become a mere job registration counter.

 Kodagu District Employment Officer Jagannath C, who is now also in charge of this office, said that the HRD Centre was closed as the three-year contract with the Laurus Edutech company (Chennai) had expired May 31, 2014. Tender process is yet to be executed further. Permanent staff are not existing and so activities are not possible. It is purely policy matter and decision should be taken at commissioner-level.

There were four staff  in the HRD centre. Job fairs have not been conducted from past one year and students are asking questions. KVTSDC failed to take decisions on continuing the successful HRD centre, because of transfer of higher officials.  Now, KVTSDC has no commissioner and Labour Commissioner has additional charge.  In fact, not only Mangaluru, six other HRD centres of the state have also been closed said an official.

In 2013-14, Mangalore HRD centre had organized five job fairs and 1,855 job aspirants participated. Among them 11 students below SSLC, 38 students who passed SSLC, PUC (171), ITI (165), diploma (223), graduate (447), post graduate (310) and technical graduates or BE (360) were selected at the job fairs. These statistics clearly show the role of job fairs. Though the HRD Centre wanted to conduct seven job fairs in 2014-15 and training camps on Modular Employment Skills (MES) in rural areas from June, it has been a non starter.  Former Mangalore HRD centre manager Rithesh Amin feels that closing of HRD Centre is an injustice to unemployed rural youth who benefit. Decisions of the government taken at higher level should not affect student community. The government should solve the problem at the earliest and job fairs should be conducted in the City.

Directorate of Employment and Training Joint Director (Training) said that service provider will be selected by the Karnataka Vocational Training and Skill Development Corporation (KVTSDC) through tender process.  Along with Mangaluru, some other HRD centres of the state will also start activities within a month. The process was delayed because of transfer of commissioners in the corporation.