India to train 1,000 Maldives civil servants for next 5 years

India's leading civil services training institution NCGG will train 1,000 Maldives civil servants over the next five years, a Ministry of Personnel statement said on Sunday.

The Ministry of External Affairs will bear all expenses of the training programme.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the capacity building of 1,000 Maldives civil servants was signed between the National Center for Good Governance (NCGG) and Maldives Civil Services Commission during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Male on Saturday, the statement said.

The agreement envisages that the NCGG will be the nodal institution for designing and implementation of customised training modules taking into account the requirements of the Maldives Civil Services Commission, said the statement.

"The areas of training programme will include public administration, e-governance and service delivery, public policy and governance, information technology, best practices in fisheries in coastal areas, agro-based practices, self-help group initiatives, urban development and planning, ethics in administration and challenges in implementation of SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals)," it added.

Maldives will nominate suitable civil servants in the senior, executive and middle management levels as per agreed timelines.

The NCGG will also assist the Civil Services Training Institute, a subsidiary of Maldives' Civil Services Commission, to develop training programmes and materials, and to organise the exchange of experts as needed by the Commission, the statement said.

K.V. Eapen, Director General, NCGG and Secretary in the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances said that NCGG had trained 28 Maldives civil servants in April and this successful engagement encouraged the two countries to take the collaboration forward.

Eapen adde that the NCGG had successfully conducted training programmes for civil servants of Bangladesh, Myanmar, Gambia and the Maldives in April.