Flaying the Capt Amarinder Singh-led Congress Government in Punjab for being insensitive to the youth, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Monday said that a large number jobless young boys and girls were driven to drugs as it had failed to live up to its poll promise on providing jobs in every household.
AAP Punjab unit president and Sangrur MP Bhagwant Mann said that the Government had miserably failed to provide jobs to a large number of youth, especially ‘Dalit’, in the state notwithstanding the fact that they held various professional and other degrees, which, he alleged, had led them to work as farm hands to eke out a living.
He alleged that the number of unemployed youth was rising year after year with the dispensation turning a blind eye to the imbroglio.
Mann alleged that the government was hiring employees on a contractual basis or outsourcing to work in the government departments, including schools and colleges and other quasi-government establishments, instead of filling the vacant post lying unfilled for a pretty long time now.
The worst affected were the ‘Dalit’ youth, who were being constantly exploited on one or other pretext, Mann said.
Mann added that the disgruntled jobless youth, especially from the rural pockets, were driven into drugs, or looking up for greener pastures on the foreign shores by pooling huge money by selling their land holding or through arranging loans on heavy interest terms.
To substantiate, he referred to a report emanating from Sangrur area, where a majority of youth, especially the ‘Dalits’ holding valid graduation or post-graduation and other professional degrees, were forced to work as farm hands to earn a living.
Mann said that AAP had been raising the issues on various public fora but nothing concrete had come out of the narrative due to the stubborn stance of the erstwhile Akali Dal government and now the Congress led State Government.
He demanded that the Government should immediately initiate measures to fill vacant posts in various government departments in the State on a permanent basis and not on contractual or outsource basis thereby redeeming its pledge to the recurring ‘ghar-ghar’ job rant to save the youth from being exploited at will.