“India is very youthful, but the youth need employability and the responsibility to felicitate it lies on the academia and industries,” said A. Selvaraj, Chairman, Industry-Academia Collaboration on Friday.
He was speaking at the Industry-Academic Collaboration Meet held at MADITSSIA hall in Madurai on Friday.
Principals, heads of departments and faculty members from as many as 21 government and private engineering, arts and science colleges took part in the meet.
Speaking to The Hindu, Mr. Selvaraj said that MADITSSIA has about 18 manufacturing-oriented sectors, including automobile, construction, engineering, furniture, printing and packaging etc.
“Despite the number of educational institutions offering specialised courses, the students who graduate with degrees are lacking the skills which leads them to find jobs beyond their field of education,” he said.
Speaking at the event, he elaborated on how it can be achieved only if industry, students, faculty and educational management make equal contributions.
“Industry wants a closer working relationship with the academics and vice versa to give students better employability. The attitude among the youth has to change, so as to encourage them to pursue jobs in their scope of education. Colleges through faculty must take special interest and be proactive in engaging the students,” said Mr. Selvaraj.
He also said that industries, who are hungry for skilled people whose innovation and research will be commercialised by them, have an equal responsibility to be open to train students when they are in college through internships etc.
Later, participants engaged in a discussion on their action plans in this regard.
MADITSSIA President M.S. Sampath, Secretary R.M. Lakshminarayanan and others were present.
