When Public Money Buys Privilege — Make It Buy Skills Too

I read the report about a Maharashtra committee recommending mandatory internships for industries that receive government incentives and felt both encouraged and cautious. On the surface this is the kind of policy logic I’ve long argued for: if the state is subsidising or incentivising industry, those public funds should return clear social value — and widening real-world experience for young people is exactly that kind of return. The news item is being discussed in local coverage (Times of India — Mumbai city).

But experience—both mine and what I’ve written about government programmes—tells me the devil is in the design and the delivery. I’ve been arguing for years that public policy must be paired with transparency, measurable accountability and digital monitoring if it is to avoid well-meaning words turning into bureaucratic theatre (DIPAM speaks to how government manages incentives and public assets). My earlier writings about making project data public and using digital dashboards to fix responsibility feel relevant here: the principle is the same — when government gives, it must also audit and publish outcomes so citizens can judge whether public benefit actually flowed.

Why linking incentives to internships is a good idea

• It aligns public subsidy with public benefit. Companies get preferential treatment; taxpayers should get something tangible in return — better-trained entrants to the workforce, easier campus-to-career transitions, local employment pipelines. That’s fair.
• It creates a natural demand signal for skills. If internships are meaningful, universities and vocational trainers will adjust to produce graduates ready for industry needs — narrowing the chronic gap between academic curricula and on-the-job skills.
• It can help reduce recruitment friction for firms, especially in regions where talent pipelines are thin; firms can shape future hires while the state ensures accountability for its subsidies.

Practical pitfalls I worry about

Policy intentions often collide with ground reality. From the last decade of watching infrastructure and incentive programmes, a few risks look familiar:

• Tokenism: firms listing “internships” that are little more than shadowing or coffee runs to tick a compliance box.
• Quality and relevance: internships must involve real responsibilities, mentoring and assessment; otherwise they don’t build capability.
• Uneven burden: small and medium firms may struggle to host structured internships even if given incentives, whereas large firms can game the system.
• Monitoring gaps: like many well-intentioned requirements, this can exist on paper while implementation remains unverifiable without robust tracking.

These are not theoretical. My long-standing case for public-facing project monitoring and digital dashboards — so everyone can see status, responsibilities and slippages — applies equally well here. If internships are mandatory in exchange for incentives, they must be auditable and visible to the public and to academic partners (No More Delayed Projects?).

Elements that would make this idea effective

If the state moves forward with conditional internships, here are the elements that, from my vantage point, are necessary for it to be more than virtue signalling:

• Clear definitions: what counts as an internship (hours, mentorship ratio, learning outcomes, assessment) must be prescribed up front.
• Learning outcomes tied to credit or certification so students and universities see real value.
• Scaled expectations: different standards for MNCs, large manufacturers, and MSMEs — with lighter-weight models for smaller firms and shared internship hubs where necessary.
• Public digital registry: a portal where every subsidised firm must register internships, upload periodic evidence (geo-tagged, time-stamped), and report outcomes — accessible to students, educators and auditors. My advocacy for transparent dashboards and public PERT-like monitoring for projects transfers directly to this context.
• Independent audits and feedback loops: periodic sampling and student surveys to detect token placements or exploitative practices.

A personal reflection — I wrote this idea in other clothes before

This policy nudges at a theme I’ve been writing about for years: public resources must come with public accountability. In earlier posts I urged that government programmes and projects be accompanied by transparent, digital monitoring so responsibility can be fixed and outcomes measured (see my comments on Gati Shakti and project dashboards). The core idea is the same — when public privilege is granted, insist on visible public benefit. Seeing a committee in Maharashtra propose exactly this now feels like a small validation of those earlier instincts: good ideas persist because they’re right.

Final thought

I welcome the notion of making internships a condition for incentives — but only if we avoid the paperwork trap and make the programme measurable, equitable and auditable. If implemented thoughtfully, it could convert state support from a unilateral subsidy into a partnership that builds skills, creates opportunity and returns value to citizens. If implemented poorly, it will be another set of boxes to tick.

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Regards,
Hemen Parekh