Bhubaneswar, Nov 4 (IANS): The Odisha government has signed an MoU and two agreements with TATA Strive and Tech Mahindra for skill development and to create employment opportunities for the youth here.

The Directorate of Technical Education and Training (DTE&T) and TATA Strive signed an agreement on Monday to impart life skills to students in all 49 government ITIs.

The Odisha Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (IDCO) signed an agreement with Tech Mahindra to set up a state-of-the-art facility to start its operations for international BPO for global customers.

This will provide additional employment in the BPO sector in the state, said an official.

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed between Tech Mahindra, Biju Patnaik University of Technology (BPUT) and College of Engineering and Technology (CET) to set up a Centre of Excellence in the area of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML).

The students will get an opportunity to work on proof of concept on real life business problems to keep up with the market demand and to enhance the employability of engineering students.

Every year, 30 students will get training in the field of AI and ML for a period of 12 months.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who was present during the signing of the agreements, said that these partnerships are in perfect sync with the skilled-in-Odisha initiative.

"Our vision is to make Odisha nucleus of global skilled manpower requirement by enhancing our skill to such a level that all the top industrial houses across the globe rope in our workforce in large numbers," he said.