National Conference Provincial President Devender Singh Rana today sought absorption of locals in the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Indian Institute of Management (IIM), All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) besides engagement of the local work-force in the central projects currently under execution in J&K, keeping in view growing job crunch.
“Institutions like IIT, IIM, AIIMS and banks have immense potential to accommodate local unemployed youth and, therefore earnest steps are needed to be taken to ensure optimum absorption of cent percent local youth in these establishments for skilled and semi skilled categories and atleast fifty percent in other categories”, the Provincial President said while addressing several roadside meetings with the residents of Panjgrian, Kattalbatal, Ban and Khalati in Nadore Panchayats. Shameem Begum, who was felicitated over registering an impressive victory in the just concluded DDC elections from Dansal, also addressed the public meetings along with BDC Chairman Nagrota Ch Rehmat Ali.
Rana said that unemployment has taken alarming proportions with educated unemployed besides skilled and unskilled workforce nurturing the feeling of let down in recent years. The situation has further worsened due to retrenchment in the private sector in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic, adding to the joblessness. There has to be some mechanism in tackling this scenario, moreso because of the limited avenues of jobs due to lack of industries and corporate sectors. He said the government and public sector are major sources of employment and therefore some rationale has to be adopted. The Provincial President stressed the need for evolving a mechanism to reserve a substantial percentage of jobs for permanent residents of Jammu and Kashmir in central government departments, public sector undertaking and defence establishments of civilian in nature. Special efforts are needed to be made in tackling the burgeoning unemployment problem here.
The Centre should devise a mechanism, making it mandatory for all the central establishments to have adequate local representation in various organisations in respect of class four jobs and other skilled and unskilled slots. He said the other categories of jobs in such organizations could be filled through the normal recruitment process with preference to the locals. He also strongly pitched for assigning job contracts of allied and ancillary works in the central projects to the local sub-contractors of the areas concerned. Rana expressed dismay over the prevailing trend of engaging non-local sub contractors and material suppliers by the construction companies, ignoring the legitimate interests of the local stakeholders. This amounts to denial of sustenance to the locals, he said, adding that such a discriminatory trend is required to be reversed.
The executing agencies should abide by their social responsibility, he maintained. The Provincial President expressed gratitude to the people for exercising their franchise in a big way during the recent elections and reposing their trust in the National Conference, which stands for inclusiveness and harmonious growth of society with opportunities of progress to all. He also congratulated Shameem Begum and hoped that she will come to the expectations of the people and ensure holistic development of Dansal DDC segment.
Prominent among those present on the occasion included Sarpanch Thoru Ram, Sarpanch Kattalbatal Rekha Jamwal, Ex-Sarpanch Kulbhushan Singh, Ex-Sarpanch Joginder Lal, Hans Raj, Noor Mohd, Ashok Kumar, Rupali, Sadiq, Shoki, Satish and others.
