Gandhinagar: Union Home Minister Amit Shah laid the foundation stone of the Indian Institute of Skills, coming up at Nasmed village of Gandhinagar, on Wednesday.

The Indian Institute of Skills is being developed on a Not-for-profit Public Private Partnership mode by the Tata Group along with the state’s Labour and Employment department. While the state government has provided land for the Institute, Tata Education Development Trust is contributing the capital investment. The state government has allotted 20 acre land at Nasmed for the Institute. A minimum of 5,000 students will pass out every year from the Institute five years after commencement of its operations, with a target to provide placement to 70 per cent of the pass-outs.

Vipul Mittra, additional chief secretary of Labour and Employment department said that the Indian Institutes of Skills are aimed at providing training and developing highly skilled technical manpower to meet the demands of highly specialized areas such as defence, aerospace, oil & gas, and deep technology.

“The Indian Institutes of Skills are expected to emerge as premier training institutions on the lines of Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), and make vocational training aspirational for the youth. They are a major step towards equipping youth with the right training and skills needed for emerging and high demand areas of the future,” he added.

Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, deputy chief minister Nitin Patel, Union Minister for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Mahendranath Pandey, Union Minister of State for New and Renewable Energy RK Singh, Gujarat Labour and Employment minister Dilipkumar Thakor, Tata Sons’ Chairman Emeritus Ratan Tata, senior bureaucrats, and industry representatives were present at the foundation stone laying programme at Mahatma Mandir in Gandhinagar.