Biggest thing that is bothering us is jobs: CII

The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) Wednesday expressed concern on the country's job market amid growing challenges of making a generation employment-ready.

CII's observation came a day after the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) flagged climbing unemployment rate in the country.

"The biggest thing that is bothering is jobs....with no new capital investment coming from the private sector due to low consumption and low utilisation in manufacturing, is a serious concern," CII president Rakesh Bharti Mittal said at the annual regional meeting here.

In a report, the CMIE has said that the unemployment rate has climbed despite a fall in the number of job seekers.

Mittal said that at present there are 300 million children between 6 amd 16 years of age who would join the job market after 10 years which could be a challenge.

"Clearly, we need work right now. Starting vocational training from the school level is very good to make people employable. The technology is moving fast and disruptions are coming every five years. The industry needs to sit together with academia and plan accordingly to make them future ready," Mittal said.

On the economy, he said the first half of 2018-19 went off well after a gap of 2-3 years of slow momentum.

"Q3 had moderated and Q4 will taper down further due to elections before theings improve," Mittal, who is also vice-chairman of Bharti Enterprises said.