Union Budget ignores glaring issue of unemployment, says Chidambaram

Former FM says only 520 mn of India's 940 mn strong workforce have some kind of job; India has a median age of 28.43, meaning that 50% are below this age, and presumably looking for jobs

Former Finance Minister P Chidamabaram criticised the NDA government’s budget for glossing over the alarming issue of unemployment faced by the country’s youth.

Chidambaram said in Rajya Sabha that the Budget Speech mentioned that six million jobs would be created in five years through the PM Gati Shakti initiative, when the annual addition to the labour force is 4.75 million. The former finance minister said of India’s workforce of 940 million, only 520 million have some kind of job, regular or irregular. He further said that India has a median age of 28.43, meaning that 50 per cent of Indians are below this age, and presumably looking for jobs. 

“The government had promised two crore (20 million) jobs a year, and they should report to us how many jobs were created,” Chidambaram said. Attributing the CMIE data on unemployment, Chidambaram said urban unemployment was 7.9 per cent, and rural unemployment was 6.54 per cent. “And the Budget Speech had one statement about job creation that through Gati Shakti and infrastructure 60 lakh (six million) jobs will be created in five years. So that is about 12 (1.2 million) lakh jobs, what will the rest do?” he said.

He stated that there were 8,72,243 vacancies in the central government as on March 31, 2021, and the Government of India recruited 78,264 persons to these vacancies leaving nearly 800,000 vacancies vacant as of today. 

Chidambaram also said that the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman should provide clarity on growth and inflation numbers projected by the government. The Union Budget projects nominal growth for FY23 to be 11.1 per cent while Economic Survey has estimated India’s real growth for next year at eight per cent. Real growth is adjusted for inflation. “If nominal nominal growth will be 11.1 and real growth will be eight per cent, in which event is the finance minister assuring this house that inflation will be only about 3.1 per cent. One of numbers is wrong!” he said.

He also said that the government has lowered the MGNREGA allocation in the Budget from Rs 98,000 crore to Rs 73,000 crore. “Welfare has been thrown to the wind, and work has not been created,” he said.