• Jairam Ramesh, M.P

Unemployment in India remains a severe problem, as well as the hidden under-employment. In his interactions at Anand Vihar Terminal, Delhi, Shri Rahul Gandhi noted that large numbers of educated youth, including those with engineering degrees, are unable to find formal employment and are forced into precarious informal jobs like that of porters.

The massive failure of the Modi government to provide sufficient formal-sector employment has led to this situation. • Employees’ Provident Fund Organization (EPFO) data for 2021-22 shows that formal sector employment remains 5.3% lower than it was in 2019-20. Further, the number of formal employers has declined by a massive 10.5% from 2019-20 to 2021-22. • According to a report from Azim Premji University, 42% of graduates under 25 were unemployed in 2021-22. Jobs in manufacturing dropped 31% between 2016-17 and March 2023, as per Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) data. • The latest Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) for Jan-March 2023 shows that even in urban areas, less than 50% of workers are salaried. The latest all-India PLFS data, including rural areas, is much worse - in 2021-22, just 21% of workers have formal jobs, which is still lower than the pre-pandemic period of 23%. Instead, self-employment and casual employment have risen. These numbers show that the unplanned lockdown, in combination with disastrous economic policies and the cronyism of the Modi government, have actually shrunk formal employment opportunities for educated youth.

We then get situations such as the following: In Jan 2023, 8,000 candidates applied for 92 clerk positions at Gujarat University, including those with MSc and MTechs. In June 2023, 10.5 lakh people applied for 4,600 clerk posts in Maharashtra, including MBAs, engineers, and PhD holders. With economic distress reducing jobs in the private sector, highly educated youth are being forced to compete for a minuscule number of government posts.

To make matters worse, even the public sector has been shrinking under the Modi government. As of August 2022, 9.8 lakh Union govt. posts were vacant; CMIE data shows that government jobs declined 20% between 2015-16 and 2022-23; India now has one of the lowest numbers of public employees per 1000 population, lower than USA, Brazil, and even China.

Rather than dealing with the employment crisis, the Modi government is busy hiding and distorting data and focusing on gimmicks. With the EPFO data, rather than rely on the stable annual estimates, they are touting unreliable monthly data, intentionally ignoring the fact that the monthly data is revised continuously by over 50% at times and has major discrepancies. To further cover up its failures in providing government employment, the Prime Minister personally holds ‘Rozgar Melas’ making a complete mockery of routine government workings. Despite massive gaps in the public sector, of close to 10 lakh vacancies, the Modi government makes a big show of 50,000 job letters for posts that were already sanctioned, and claims that it is generating employment. Further, RTI data from The Telegraph shows that while all job letters at ‘Rozgar Melas’ are being presented as “new recruits,” a sizeable number are actually just promotions.

Most disheartening of all is a statistic from the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) April 2023 report. A full 33% of India’s youth neither has a job, nor is taking educational or training courses; this number rises to over 50% for women. The Modi government has crushed the hopes and dreams of India’s youth, to the point that they do not have jobs, and have given up on the future and to the point that they refuse to invest in education or training. The tragic consequence of this is that the youth suicide rate (age below 30) has been growing sharply since 2016, and has reached 4.9 per lakh population in 2021, the highest in 25 years. Instead of dealing with the crisis of demographic dividend turning into a demographic disaster, we should not be surprised if the Modi government’s next move is to manipulate the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data due for 2022 to hide the alarming suicide rate amongst the youth.

Based on statement issued by Shri Jairam Ramesh, MP and General Secretary (Communication), AICC on September 28, 2023