It is shocking that contrary to the claims made by the BJP leadership in the UT and at the Centre about working day and night for over ten years to realize colossal development and new avenues for the employment, the latest Periodic Labour Force Survey has revealed that J&K has a 32 percent unemployment rate among youth and a heart-stopping 53.6 percent joblessness among members of fair sex, which are presently topping the lists across the country respectively.
The aforesaid survey has been released by none other than the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation revealing alarming unemployment statistics, with Jammu and Kashmir emerging as the epicentre of youth joblessness in India. These statistics have punctured the BJP’s balloon of doing wonders in J&K especially after 2019 as employment status has astonished one and all because what is being said about this region is far from reality as promises made in the last over ten years by the centre, BJP-PDP government in J&K and the LG’s administration regarding new industrial policy, tourism avenues, job Melas, etc to generate thousands of jobs seem to have been fallen flat with joblessness remaining the core issue confronting the people and governments as J&K has come out with a worst record of providing livelihood avenues to its residents in the shape of jobs.
As far as the recently formed National Conference (NC) government led by Omar Abdullah is concerned, it has inherited a difficult situation. As only a month has passed when Omar Abdullah has taken over the reins of J&K therefore it is too early to point fingers at the new government for the gigantic problem of unemployment, which is standing tall before the region.
Like in the case of successive regimes, the NC government’s ability to promote job creation will also be under scrutiny and shall be analyzed in days to come by the stakeholders. Although challenges will remain big and peculiar due to the legacy of the last decade, the security situation, and the lingering effects of central policies but as the leadership of this party has promised a suitable change. Therefore it should toil hard and bring the desirable changes to bail out unemployed youth from the morass and misery to prove its mettle.
