Swelling unemployment rate worrisome

The figures shown in the report prepared by Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) has belied the government claims yet again about the unemployment in Jammu and Kashmir as despite claiming that the unemployment rate is decreasing the, the report has indicated further surge by nearly three percent for the month of May. The reports suggest that from 15.6 per cent in April, the unemployment rate has swelled to 18.3 per cent in Jammu and Kashmir, which is higher than that of national average and contrary to the downward trend across the country. One fails to understand how the unemployment rate has swelled in J&K at a time when the government is claiming to have taken adequate measures to ensure employment to the educated but unemployed people. The increase in the unemployment rate here has questioned the decisions and steps taken by the government with regard to employment for people here. The facts cannot be denied that the government issued advertisements for several posts, but unfortunately at the same time, many jobs were either cancelled or the posts advertised were not filled due to some unknown issues, which simultaneously added to the number of unemployed people. Some people in the recent past have also staged a protest in favour of their jobs as they too are apprehensive that their jobs will be snatched and they will be made unemployed again. However, the government clarified that it has no such plans. It is the high time to work in the right direction to address the grave issue of unemployment so that the people, especially the youth here could heave a sigh of relief.