More Stories

Informist, Friday, Jan. 31, 2025

NEW DELHI – Education and skilling will play a critical role in India's successful adoption of artifical intelligence and minimising labour displacement, the Economic Survey for 2024-25 (Apr-Mar) said. "Education and skilling are going to play a critical role in driving the success of human-centric AI adoption in the country while minimising labour displacement as best we can. If history has taught us anything, it is that with each subsequent technological revolution, the floor for what is considered a basic skill has risen," the survey, tabled in Parliament by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, said on Friday. 

Stating that India's employment challenge is not just about numbers but also about raising the overall quality of the workforce, it said that improvements in the quality of the workforce must focus on more foundational skills such as soft skills and core competencies which are valuable across industries and roles. "Foundational skills support the learning of tech-specific skills by fostering adaptability and cognitive agility... The silver lining is that due to the research and development nature of artificial intelligence, India, this time, has the opportunity to catch up with, if not get ahead of the curve and prepare its workforce," it said. 

According to the survey, the current time should be wisely used to prepare the workforce with the skills they need for the future. The country needs to find ways to reduce the negative impacts on society, especially considering India's diverse population and economy, it said. 

Suggesting that the labour augmenting potential of artifical intelligence should not be ignored, it said labour and technology, when integrated in the right way, have complemented one another rather than being substitutes. "Technical change did not always lead to declining employment in the affected industry; rather, it has resulted in strong employment growth during the decades the technology was being refined," it said. 

The economic survey highlighted that research has already demonstrated how the introduction of generative artificial intelligence assistants augmenting customer support personnel increased productivity by 14% on average, including a 34% improvement for new and lower-skilled workers. "Implementing AI as a tool helps bridge the skill gap, allowing low-skilled workers to produce outputs closer in quality to the work high skilled workers do without any tools. The reduction in skill inequality is a big positive on aggregate since the overall productivity increases," the survey said.

It suggested a tripartite agreement between the government, private sector and academia to ensure that the gains from artifical intelligence-driven productivity are widely distributed. The survey has also advised the corporate sector to display a high degree of social responsibility, as the problem with the impact of artificial intelligence on labour is magnified for India, given its size and its relatively low per capita income.  End

Reported by Pallavi Singhal

Edited by Saji George Titus

For users of real-time market data terminals, Informist news is available exclusively on the NSE Cogencis WorkStation.

Cogencis news is now Informist news. This follows the acquisition of Cogencis Information Services Ltd by NSE Data & Analytics Ltd, a 100% subsidiary of the National Stock Exchange of India Ltd. As a part of the transaction, the news department of Cogencis has been sold to Informist Media Pvt Ltd.

Informist Media Tel +91 (11) 4220-1000

Send comments to feedback@informistmedia.com

© Informist Media Pvt. Ltd. 2025. All rights reserved.