Bhaskar Parichha
As joblessness is on the sharp rise in the country, millions of educated youngsters continue to be fixated about government jobs. All through a calendar year, the masses are seen preparing for competitive exams in an otherwise feeble and shrinking pool of government jobs.
A recent survey by the Centre for Equity Studies (CES) throws light on the problems of the educated unemployed across three North Indian cities of Delhi, Jaipur and Allahabad. The survey mainly focused on those who vie for the ‘sarkari’ post. The survey was conducted among 515 respondents across these three cities that are also coaching hubs for competitive exams. Even if the survey was limited to a particular region, it is relevant elsewhere too.
The survey – entitled “Between Aspiration & Despair: Government Jobs & The Predicament of The Educated Unemployed” – was undertaken “to better understand the experience, challenges, social background, investment (of time and money) and expectations of the educated unemployed jostling for jobs.”Of the total respondents, 72% were graduates while 19% were post-graduates.
Upsetting
The findings of the survey are upsetting, if not shocking. It reveals that not only do the majority of the educated unemployed prefer government jobs over private ones, they view the private sector in negative terms: less secure, unequal, exploitative, and paying not as much for long hours of work.“The perception of jobs in the private sector is dominantly negative. Many respondents who previously worked in the private sector reported their working conditions to be undesirably exploitative and wages below par,” says the report.
What’s more, India’s educated unemployed don’t concur that privatization is the answer to the rampant joblessness in the country .It may be recalled that the recently ‘leaked’ National Sample Survey Organization’s report had pegged unemployment at a 45-year high.
Across the cities, the survey recorded a largely negative perception among respondents with regard to private sector’s role in resolving the current job crisis. Consequently, a good number of the youth considers further expansion of government jobs as the way forward.
Not surprisingly, 71% of the educated youths who were surveyed thought that the Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party government at the centre has failed to create adequate number of jobs.
Paradoxical
India’s present job crisis is anybody’s guess and it is unmistakably terrible. For quite some time now, we have been reading news reports about how even for Class IV jobs the applicants came from such backgrounds as MBAs and PhDs.Clearly, India’s educated youth don’t rely on private sector jobs any longer.
It is a paradoxical situation that on the one hand there is shrinkage of government jobs, while the demand for these jobs are constantly on the rise. Without a doubt, the well-educated youth of today isn’t enamored with the private sector.
Not so long ago, when India ushered in liberalization and economic reforms, educated Indians looking for employment were in love with the private sector. Hordes of highly qualified youths were seen leaving secured government jobs and joining corporate entities. That trend seems to be over now and for good.
Obsession
India’s fixation for government jobs is as old as the hills. And, the education system is to be blamed for such kind of fascination. Whom to blame for this clumsy situation? At present, if the higher education structure in India produces young people fit only for ten-to-five jobs, they continue to stay put as unskilled and maladroit workers .Then, of course, the realism that in government jobs one doesn’t have to do much.
As regards Class four jobs in government attracting applications from such exalted backgrounds as MBAs and PhDs, the fact remains that India’s educated youth have a predominant mindset for government jobs. The survey underlined the urgency to minimally land on a job in the government sector.
Professionalism
It is improper not to acknowledge the truth that with the coming of multinational companies to India and with the dominance of the corporate sector, a good number of new jobs were created in the past two decades. But those highly-paid jobs went exclusively to those who had acquired superior skills and were potent with professional qualifications. Even now, corporate jobs are reserved only for those who are specialized for specific jobs and whose talent is largely steered towards earning profits by the companies they work for.
One positive aspect in private sector jobs in the last twenty years was that employees were paid well in the initial phases. But as the economy bumped and profits came slashing down, not only private sector jobs disappeared from the scene even salaries witnessed a downward trend. An offshoot of this redundancy is that the same magnitude of work is handled by lesser number of personnel.
Motivation
What is more, there isn’t any benchmark for labor standards. As a result, neither hours of work are fixed nor the corresponding wages. All this is a grim reminder for the incoming government. The task is clearly cut out for the new regime at the centre: there should be more jobs in the government/ public sector; and at the same time there must be added motivation for the educated youth to accept private sector jobs that comes on their way. A recent report says that vacancies in the central government positions have risen up to some 25 lakhs – not a small number given the fact that unemployment in the country has become a huge nightmare both for the job-seeker and the job-provider.
As Nikhila Henry writes in her book The Ferment – Youth Unrest in India, ‘between 2010 and 2040,300 million people are expected to join the work force. In 2031, the number of job seekers would peak at 653 million people…if this teeming cohort of youngsters were left unemployed, Global economists predict it would become a potential source of political and social instability.’
(The writer is a senior journalist and Consulting Editor, OdishaPlus)
