IT consortium’s proposal to set up a skill university in Orissa

Following is a report from expressbuzz.com:

BHUBANESWAR: A Consortium of information technology (IT) companies has proposed to launch a training programme for plus-two students of the State to increase their employability. 

The consortium members, led by Ganesh Natarajan, chairman of the CII’s national committee on IT, discussed the proposal with Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik here on Friday. The consortium companies include IT companies, GTT, Merytrack, Genpack, Corporate Gurukul and Cisco Tech Limited.  

Orissa will be the ninth State where the consortium has launched the programme. The consortium plans to train 12,000 plus-two students in the State in three phases. In the first phase, 2,000 students will train followed by 5,000 each in the next two phases. The programme includes talent assessment, counselling of the students, training, examination, certification, internship and placement.

 The training will be for a period of six months. Official sources said that communication skills and computer knowledge of the students will be increased through the programme. The consortium also submitted a proposal for setting up a skills university in Orissa. The university, land for which is yet to be located, will start functioning from 2012.  

The university will help formalise the training programme on a permanent basis. Besides the Chief Minister, senior officials from the Chief Minister’s secretariat and IT department were present.