Overview
- The NITI Aayog report, released Wednesday, calls for a National Policy on Caregiving and proposes a National Caregiver Council to set standards, accredit workers and coordinate across ministries.
- It recommends creating a dedicated caregiver cadre and a National Digital Caregiving Portal or registry to certify workers, match them with families and improve workforce planning.
- The report ties its proposals to demographic data that project India’s elderly population will grow sharply by 2050 and to WHO/OECD forecasts of global care-worker shortages that create export opportunities for trained Indian caregivers.
- It urges measures to professionalize the workforce through competency-based training, certification, career pathways and expanded social security, including ideas such as care leave and MSME support for caregiving businesses.
- If adopted, the plan could raise wages, formalize millions of informal carers and boost women’s labour-force participation, but implementation will need cross-ministry agreement, funding and stakeholder consultation before becoming law.