18% Telangana youth have no aspiration to work in India: ASER

HYDERABAD: At a time when unemployment among youth was made a key issue in the recent assembly elections in Telangana, the latest Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) Survey-2023 says the state has the highest number of youth in the country who are simply not looking for work.
India's youngest state, which was formed in June 2014 after a hard-fought statehood movement for its own water, resources and jobs, has the largest percentage (18%) of boys/youth who do not want to work in the country as they wish to seek greener pastures elsewhere.Interestingly, only 2.1% of boys and girls in the entire country said they do not see a future here.
Though only 11% of Telangana's women said they do not wish to work in the country, they went on to top the charts among all the states in this category.
Many boys in Telangana don't want to work or not sure what job to take up: Pratham survey
NGO Pratham's annual survey took samples from Khammam district and economic experts said survey outcome needed a deeper analysis and immediate intervention by all the stakeholders, including governments.
In both categories of "don't want to work and don't know which work to take up," the percentage of boys from Telangana is way too high compared to many other states.
Development economist PSM Rao said: "We should look at this scenario with empathy. The primacy of the statehood movement agitation was driven by the youth dreaming of government jobs. Lack of government jobs is a matter of grave concern even now."
He said: "It's in fitness of things that people are dejected by lack of government jobs. On the contrary, we teach youth that the only safe and good option for their future is a government job which is absurd."
The survey, mainly focusing on the 14-18 age group, also tried to know about the future aspirational jobs and professions among youth. Students were asked to respond to 12 types of jobs, including government, private, doctor or nurse, police, and so on.
They were also asked if they wanted to continue with their family enterprise, and if they wished to work at all.
None of the states has such a high percentage of students who said they did not want to work, barring neighbouring state of Andhra Pradesh at 4.5% and Madhya Pradesh at 5.5%, the report said.
Senior analyst S Ramakrishna said the government and other stakeholders should dig deep and look at the larger picture. "We need to understand first that 16-18 is still a tender age and not many will develop their views. Some economists and market experts will say that freebies are making youth unambitious or that they are not bothered about their jobs. But, there could be deeper social and psychological aspects which need to be probed," he told TOI.