New Delhi, Aug. 12 -- Since the Union government launched its flagship rural skilling programme in 2014, more than 1.8 million rural youth have been trained under it, but nearly one in three did not secure a reported placement, according to a Parliamentary Standing Committee report released on Tuesday. The Standing Committee on Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, headed by Congress MP Saptagiri Sankar Ulaka, questioned the Ministry of Rural Development on why only 1.2 million of the 1.8 million candidates trained under the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana (DDU-GKY) had been placed in employment. The panel also questioned the performance of the Rural Self Employment Training Institutes (RSETIs), under which only 4.5 million of 6.2 million trained beneficiaries had been "settled" in self-employment. Launched in September 2014, DDU-GKY aims to move rural youth aged 15 to 35 from poor households into regular wage employment through industry-linked training. The ministry told the committee that the overall placement rate of about 65% varied significantly across states and argued that the headline numbers did not capture the full impact of the programme. "Overall, the country's current placement ratio of 65% is a fact, but it varies from state to state," an official told the committee. The government also attributed part of the apparent decline to changes introduced under DDU-GKY 2.0, which came into effect in April 2025. The revamped scheme doubled the minimum period for a job to qualify as a placement from three months to six months. The scheme also expanded eligible outcomes to include self-employment and gig work, ended advance payments to training providers and shifted to milestone-based funding. However, reported placements fell sharply in 2025-26, with the placement rate dropping to 47.7%, from an average of 77.7% over the preceding three financial years....