J-K govt exploring jobs in private sector for unemployed youth

SRINAGAR: Maintaining that it cannot provide jobs to all the educated unemployed youths in the state, Jammu and Kashmir government today said it was exploring job opportunities for them in private sector.

State government is well aware of the problem of unemployment and is exploring possibility of job opportunities for the youths in private sector, Minister for Labour and Employment Mangat Ram Sharma told the legislative assembly in a written reply.

The minister said there was no proposal to provide Rs 500 and Rs 1000 per month as stipend to the matriculate and graduate unemployed youths respectively in view of financial constraints.

He said the government is a big employer in providing job opportunities to the unemployed youths by creating maximum number of jobs both in gazetted and non-gazetted cadres.

However, it is not possible for the state government to provide government jobs to all the educated unemployed youth in view of resource crunch, he said.

Sharma said the government has launched a new industrial policy in 2004 under which it is providing a number of incentives to entrepreneurs to set up industrial units. As many as 27625 people have been provided employment in private sector between 2003 to 2007.

Sharma said the government is also implementing a number of self employment schemes sponsored by both the Central and state government including J and K self employment scheme under which educated unemployed persons in the age group of 18-40 are provided loans for establishing their own employment generating units.