Nearly 4,000 people of Dehradun district have registered themselves for employment and self employment opportunities so far through Helping Out People Everywhere (HOPE) portal. This portal was inaugurated by Uttarakhand chief minister Trivendra Singh Rawat on May 13 and according to the officials, the HOPE portal helps in collecting a database of skilled and unskilled people of the district so that the administration can help facilitate employment opportunities for them.
As informed by Dehradun chief development officer (CDO) Nitika Khandelwal, there are about 3,900 people in the district who have registered themselves for employment opportunities.
She said that it is up to an applicant whether he or she is looking for training or self employment opportunity in a specific field. Explaining the process in details, the regional employment officer (REO) Mamta Chauhan Negi said that the list of registered applicants in the portal is sent to the departments concerned regarding the field in which the applicants have shown their interest through the application. Subsequently, the officials from these departments contact the applicants and hear about their work plan and inform them about the available options including the norms which must be fulfilled by each applicant, added Negi. On the question of how many applicants have benefited from this initiative so far, Negi said that most of these opportunities are being provided under Mukhyamantri Swarozgar Yojana (MSY) and most of the work is under process as the scheme was started only about two months ago.
The REO also informed that most of the applicants who have registered in the portal till now are men and most of them have shown their interest in the spheres of tourism and horticulture. While this portal and the scheme was launched to provide employment opportunities to the natives who have returned to the State due to Covid-19 pandemic, the CDO said that all kind of people are registering in the portal. "Besides the returnees, people who live in the district have also applied for the self-employment opportunities in the portal. No discrimination is being done from the district administration's side between the returnees and other applicants in providing employment opportunities," stated Khandelwal.
On being asked about how effective these employment opportunities can be in order to prevent migration in the rural areas, Khandelwal said that though not much can be said about it currently, this initiative will definitely provide a support system and a boost to those who want to do something here.