Only 20% of candidates accepted PM Internship Scheme offers: data

Only 20% of candidates accepted PM Internship Scheme offers: data

While the PM Internship Scheme’s pilot project has exceeded its target of providing 1.25 lakh internship opportunities in a year, it has found few takers among India’s youth, data presented to Parliament show.

Over two phases, 1.65 lakh internship offers were made by companies to applicants, Minister of State for Corporate Affairs Harsh Malhotra informed the Lok Sabha in a reply to a question. Of these offers, only 20% were accepted. Candidates cited locations, roles, and duration as reasons for declining offers. Of those who accepted offers, one-fifth of participants left their internships before completing them.

The Prime Minister Internship Scheme (PMIS) was announced in the Union Budget 2024 with the aim of providing internship opportunities to one crore youth in India’s top 500 companies in five years. In October 2024, the Ministry of Corporate Affairs launched a pilot project for the scheme, targeting 1.25 lakh internship opportunities in a year.

Low acceptance rates
Under the first round of the pilot project, companies posted more than 1.27 lakh internship opportunities on the scheme portal, for which 6.21 lakh applications were received. The companies made 82,000 internship offers, of which 8,700 or 10.6% of the offers were accepted.

The Minister’s reply noted that, as of November 26, 4,565 candidates from the first round had left their internships without completing them. That is, more than half the candidates that started their internships in the first round left before finishing their term.

In the second round of the pilot scheme from January onwards, companies posted over 1.18 lakh internship opportunities for which they received over 4.55 lakh applications. As of November 26, companies have made over 83,000 offers, of which 24,600 offers or 30% were accepted.

So far, 2,053 candidates — or 8.3% of the ones who accepted internships in the second round — have left without completing their internships, the government said.

Taken together, this means that over the two rounds, 1.65 lakh internship offers were made, of which 33,300 (20.2%) offers were accepted. Of those that were accepted, 6,618 (19.9%) candidates quit their internships prematurely.

The government had initially budgeted ₹840 crore for the pilot project, which was revised down to ₹380 crore in the financial year 2024-25. Of this, the pilot project has so far utilised ₹73.72 crore, the reply said.