How desperate young India is for jobs—and how the country could lose the plot on its demographic dividend—is evident from the mad rush for 368 openings for peons in various government offices in Uttar Pradesh. That apart, what is shocking is the overqualified profiles of many applicants. Of the nearly 23 lakh who have applied—that’s nearly 6,250 applicants per post—255 are PhDs. The minimum-education criterion for the post, as advertised, is fifth-grade-pass. There are over 2 lakh graduates and almost 25,000 postgraduates, across disciplines such as engineering, commerce, management and physical & natural sciences in the mix. Only 53,426 applicants had not studied beyond the fifth grade.
Given the overwhelming numbers, the state government is planning to conduct a written test to shortlist ‘eligibles’—which means that there is every likelihood that candidates with just primary school education, for whom these opportunities were meant, would lose out to collegiates and doctorates in the fray. The youth in the state, thus, are left grappling with colossal underemployment for some and unemployment for the rest. One of the ways out—and this is highlighted by the sheer number of applicants for a low-level government job—is to create conditions in which industry-led job creation can thrive. A McKinsey study shows that pro-business policies such as flexibility in labour laws and encouragement of big industries lead to better incomes and more jobs. Given UP is already set in the right direction—it figures in the list of top-10 Indian states for reforms that make doing business easier—it perhaps needs to mount more reforms, faster.
