Indian education officials make case for engaging industry much earlier at curriculum design

India produces one of the world’s largest pools of engineering talent, yet employers continue to point to a gap between academic learning and workplace readiness. 

As technology and industry requirements evolve faster than conventional curriculum cycles, closer collaboration between universities and employers could help ensure that students graduate with the practical capabilities required in the workplace. 

“Industry should be a strong partner to academia, bringing real-world problems, emerging

technologies and current workplace expectations into the learning process, while universities continue to provide strong academic foundations,” says Prof Vignesh Muthuvijayan, Coordinator of the Bachelor of Science Degree, Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT–Madras), to GovInsider. 

IIT-Madras is a public technical and research university. 

Recent initiatives illustrate how such partnerships could work in practice. 

ArcelorMittal Nippon Steel India (AM/NS India) and Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology (SVNIT), for instance, have launched a one-year Employability Enhancement Program combining academic learning with industry exposure. 

Similarly, the Boeing Sukanya Program, launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in January 2024, aims to encourage more girls and women to pursue careers in aviation and Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM).  

The programme includes STEM labs at planned locations across India and scholarships for women training to become pilots. 

From classrooms to workplaces 

For industry-academia partnerships to have a meaningful impact, industry participation needs to begin well before recruitment. 

At IIT Madras, industry professionals are involved in curriculum design to ensure programmes remain aligned with changing industry requirements.  

Industry practitioners also teach courses and conduct viva-voce (oral) examinations, which gives students direct exposure to professional expectations. 

In Prof Muthuvijayan’s discipline, students undertake an eight-month industry apprenticeship, earning academic credits while working on real organisational requirements.

This is complemented by hands-on projects and industry-oriented courses designed to build technical, problem-solving and workplace capabilities.The state of Telangana is also seeking to strengthen experiential learning across higher education. 

The Telangana Council of Higher Education (TGCHE) is promoting internships, project work, case analysis and community engagement to connect classroom learning with workplace and wider society. 

“Such practical exposure helps students understand society better and can also improve their prospects of securing employment,” says Professor V. Balakista Reddy, Chairman, TGCHE, to GovInsider. 

For example, an internship can give a student an opportunity to demonstrate their capabilities to an employer and potentially lead to a job. 

The skills gap is becoming more specific 

The challenge facing engineering education is the lack of ability to translate that knowledge into workplace capability. 

According to Omair Shahid, Head, Kaushal Connect Cell, Government of Uttar Pradesh, students may have studied subjects relevant to an industry, but employers expect them to apply that knowledge in specific job-role contexts using current software, technologies and workflows. 

The Kaushal Connect Cell is a workforce facilitation and intelligence unit within the state government to bridge the gap between large-scale industrial investments and the state's skilled workforce.  

Especially in technology-intensive and advanced manufacturing sectors, industry requirements can change faster than conventional curriculum cycles.  

“Industry demand is becoming much more granular,” Shahid says to GovInsider. 

“A company needs people who can perform specific functions within an artificial intelligence (AI)/ML, semiconductor, or digital operations environment.” 

This means higher education institutions may need to move beyond broad skill categories and focus more closely on the capabilities required for specific roles. 

That could include electives, industry-led courses, capstone projects, internships and other forms of practical exposure. 

The objective is to establish a stronger connection between what employers need, what institutions teach and what students are able to do. 

Moving beyond recruitment 

To scale industry-academia collaborations, companies need to move beyond their traditional role as recruiters of graduates. 

Shahid argues that industry engagement needs to extend across the entire talent development cycle — from identifying emerging job roles and validating curricula to bringing practitioners into classrooms and providing access to current tools, technologies, live projects and internships. 

“Industry can play a much larger role in helping institutions understand the emerging job roles, required capabilities and competencies, validating curriculum, bringing expert practitioners into classrooms, and providing exposure to current tools and technologies,” he says. 

But making this happen at scale presents its own challenge. 

Individual universities cannot be expected to build deep relationships with every industry, while companies may not have the resources to engage with institutions on an ad-hoc basis. 

This creates a potential role for ecosystem-level facilitators like his to bring employers and educational institutions together, aggregate industry requirements and match them with institutional capabilities. 

The larger objective, Shahid says, is to create a continuous feedback loop between industry demand, academic learning and talent outcomes. 

Preparing students for industries that do not yet exist 

The challenge is also about anticipating future workforce requirements, rather than simply responding to current needs. 

Reddy points to aviation as an example. While India’s aviation sector is expanding, the education system has relatively fewer programmes focused specifically on airport, airline and airspace management. 

“India’s aviation sector is growing rapidly, and many new airports and airlines are coming up,” he says. “As an education system, we have a responsibility to understand what kind of human resources industries will require over the next five to ten years and prepare students accordingly.”

The answer, however, is not to replace conventional degree programmes. 

Instead, universities need to make them more relevant to a changing economy. 

Telangana state is working towards integrating four components across undergraduate education: technology; management and entrepreneurship; law, policy and governance; and experiential learning. 

Students across disciplines, Reddy says, need some exposure to technology.  

Educational institutions in Telangana have introduced subjects such as technology ethics and AI and its applications, while the management component introduces students to business and startups. 

The aim is also to encourage students to become potential job creators rather than only job seekers. 

Experiential learning also gives students academic credit for activities such as internships, case analysis and community service. 

Building the ecosystem 

These reforms are still at an early stage, and implementing them at scale will require changes, not only to curricula, but also to faculty capabilities and industry participation. 

Telangana state is consulting students, parents, teachers, universities and government stakeholders while developing syllabi and learning materials.  

It is also planning faculty-development programmes and exploring the use of AI tutors to support teaching and learning. 

Industry participation is another important component. 

For example, a college introducing an aviation course could establish agreements with relevant industry organisations to provide students with internships and practical exposure.  

The approach could help ensure that academic programmes evolve alongside the economy. 

For IIT Madras, the experience of integrating industry mentorship, technical assessments, professional interactions, apprenticeships, internships and recruitment partnerships offers one possible model. 

The next step is to determine whether such partnerships can move beyond individual institutions and become part of a wider higher-education ecosystem. 

“Industry should be a strong partner to academia,” Muthuvijayan says.