Unemployment highest in 40 years; lots of unrest, frustration in youth: Priyanka

Congress Lok Sabha MP and general-secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Monday, 24 August claimed that India's unemployment rate is at its highest level in 40 years, attributing recent student protests to a combination of a "failed education system" and lack of job creation over the past 12 years.

"There is a lot of unrest, disappointment and frustration amongst the youth. We have seen that in the student protests. It is a combination of a failed education system and no job creation in the last 12 years," Priyanka Gandhi told reporters in the Parliament House complex.

She was responding to a question about a recent NITI Aayog report estimating that 8.7 crore people aged 15 to 29 are neither studying, working nor receiving any training.

The report, titled 'Reimagining Skilling for Viksit Bharat@2047', calls for subsidised training programmes to promote self-employment and align skilling with local needs and emerging sectors. Its estimates are based on data from the 78th round of the National Sample Survey conducted in 2021.

Priyanka, who represents Wayanad in the Lok Sabha, also alleged that successive government policies had undermined sectors such as agriculture and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), which are major sources of employment.

"There has been no emphasis on manufacturing and MSMEs, and certain policies are crippling small businesses, which are job providers, and even the farm sector," she said. "It is something that we have been raising for a while."

The NITI Aayog report categorises India's workforce and learners into five groups — those in school, tertiary education, formal and informal employment, youth not in education, employment or training (NEET), and women.

It notes that NEET youth face constraints arising from the absence of income and the sunk cost of previous education, while students often struggle to take up paid skilling programmes alongside existing financial commitments.

The report defines NEET youth as people aged 15 to 29 who are not engaged in education, employment or training, including those who are unemployed.

With PTI inputs