CMIE study: At 37.4%, Haryana has highest unemployment rate in India

Quoting the CMIE’s data, the Congress, the main Opposition party in Haryana, led by Bhupinder Singh Hooda, the Leader of Opposition, accused the state government of not taking adequate steps to curb the increasing rate of unemployment in the state.

Hooda said, “The change in month and year is not bringing any relief to the people as Haryana continues to be number one in unemployment in the country. This (unemployment rate) is 4.5 times more than the national average. Last month, Haryana had 30.6 per cent unemployment rate and it seems that Haryana is breaking its own record every time in terms of unemployment.”

“While on one hand, employment opportunities are plummeting to new lows every month, on the other hand, the BJP-JJP coalition government is constantly playing with the future of the unemployed youths. About two lakh posts are lying vacant in the government departments of Haryana. Instead of making permanent recruitment against these posts, the government is promoting the practice of hiring contractual employees through Skill Employment Corporation,” Hooda said.

He added, “The government departments and posts are being abolished continuously. Taking one more step forward in this direction, the government has issued an order to shut down Hisar Doordarshan, which was created for informative discussions on farmers and contemporary issues and telecast of the state news and cultural programmes. Due to this decision, dozens of employees working in the channel will become unemployed and the infrastructure worth crores of rupees will become useless. Haryanvi artists and other experts associated with Doordarshan will not be able to showcase their art and or share their expertise with the people,” Hooda said.

INLD MLA Abhay Chautala, who is also the former Leader of Opposition, too slammed the state government on CMIE’s unemployment rate data.

“It is extremely shameful that the BJP-JJP coalition government, from 2014 till 2022, had collected Rs 206 crore from unemployed youth as registration fee but failed to provide permanent government jobs to the youths. It is even more worrisome that the coalition government is also shunting out such employees who had been working for several years,” Chautala said, adding, “The Haryana government has made Haryana Public Service Commission and Haryana Staff Selection Commission redundant.”

Quoting Rajasthan’s unemployment rate (28.5 per cent), Chautala also slammed the Congress for being “no better than BJP”.

The Opposition, in the recently-concluded winter session of the Haryana Vidhan Sabha, had raised the issue of rising unemployment in Haryana. Questions were also raised by the Opposition on Haryana government’s Haryana Kaushal Rozgar Nigam through which the state government is providing temporary one-year jobs to the unemployed people of the state.

However, during the session, Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar had cited several reasons and had said, “It is not possible for the state government to provide government jobs beyond a limit.”

Khattar had announced, “A Rationalization Commission will be set up in the state to rationalise posts in government departments as per the requirement. This commission will rationalise the number of posts in every department so that the vacant posts are filled up not on political reasons but on the basis of the need of a particular department.”

Further justifying his ground, Khattar had said, “It may be possible to provide only 20,000 government jobs in a year, not more than that. We have given 1 lakh jobs in the last eight years and now, efforts will be made to recruit a maximum 50,000 more employees in the coming days.”

The Chief Minister had also cited various steps that the state government is taking to ensure more and more employment in the state. “Through the Haryana Kaushal Rozgar Nigam, manpower is being made available in government departments and corporations in a transparent manner. Also, if any private company or agency is in need of manpower, then it can send its demand to the Nigam. The government has made such a system in a transparent manner, in which it is also being ensured that the youths get EPF and ESI benefits.”

He added, “The state government has constituted an Overseas Placement Cell. Under this, assistance is being provided by the government to send the youths abroad to provide employment opportunities. Until now, only private agencies used to send youths abroad through illegal means. Thus, the government introduced a fair platform, so that the youths can take advantage of this and find employment opportunities abroad in a transparent manner.”

Chief Secretary issues directions to all administrative secretaries

Haryana Chief Secretary Sanjeev Kaushal, Tuesday, directed all the administrative secretaries to send new and pending requisition of Group-D posts of their departments to the Haryana Staff Selection Commission (HSSC) by January 7, 2023 for the Common Eligibility Test (Group-D) Examination which will be held soon.

Kaushal also informed that some posts of Group-D need specialisation in their work for posts of cooks, barbers, waiters, dressers, cleaners, animal attendants, cobblers, gardeners, carpenters, painters, tailors etc. Therefore, these categories need particular experience and special training. He also directed the departments to mention their experience and special training for the particular posts of Group-D in their department. “The departments can also take up the matter with the HSSC for any clarification regarding submission of Group-D requisition,” he added.