India’s economy soars, but youth crave government jobs

MUMBAI:

Sunil Kumar, a 30-year-old, has spent the last 9 years of his life chasing a job in the Indian government.

Crammed with dozens of others in makeshift classrooms under tin roofs with barely enough light and air, Kumar has spent years cramming for a series of tests, including the infamous civil service exam required to land a job as a federal government bureaucrat. He also tried for a provincial civil service post and two other tests for lower level government posts.

He has failed in 13 attempts to find a job.

A resident of Uttar Pradesh, the country’s most populous state, Kumar says he will continue to strive for a public post until he turns 32, three years before the cut-off for appearing in civil services exams.

“There is more security in government jobs,” Kumar said. “If it’s done in 2-3 years, the 10-year struggle will be worth it.”

According to government data, 220 million people applied for federal jobs between 2014-2022, of which 722,000 were selected. Many of these would be repeat efforts, but still, tens of millions of young Indians chase government jobs every year, even as the economy booms and the private sector expands.

The trend highlights the cultural and economic concerns many Indians face. Despite living in the world’s fastest-growing major economy, many struggle with an uncertain job market where job opportunities, let alone job security, are hard to come by. Many consider public employment more secure than private sector jobs in the world’s most populous nation.

“If one person in the family gets a government job, the family thinks it’s for life,” said Zafar Baksh, who runs a training institute for those appearing in tests for such jobs.

Since Thursday, the country has been cut off from the world.

In neighboring Bangladesh, student protests against fixed quotas in government jobs killed more than 100 people last week.

Since 2014, India’s GDP has grown from $2 trillion to nearly $3.5 trillion in fiscal year 2023-24 (April-March) and is expected to grow by 7.2% this year.

Candidates say the government offers lifelong security, health benefits, pensions and housing that they might not get in private employment. Few will admit it, but many government jobs also offer the prospect of money under the table.

Growing demand for crammed classrooms has attracted big players, and classes have also moved online, said Baksh, who sees it as a profitable and perennial business.

“There will always be demand.”

There aren’t enough good jobs

Discontent over job opportunities was cited by analysts as a key reason why Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party failed to win a majority on its own in the April-May general election and returned to power only with the support of allies.

Government data released this month showed 20 million new job opportunities were created in India each year since 2017/18, but private economists said much of this was self-employment and temporary farm employment rather than formal positions with regular wages.

The government, which presents its first budget since the election next week, is likely to boost job creation by giving tax incentives for new manufacturing facilities as well as encouraging local procurement in sectors such as defence, Nomura said in a note this month. But these will take time to provide jobs.

“It’s not just that there aren’t enough jobs out there, it’s also that there aren’t enough jobs that pay well and give you tenure security and other benefits,” said Rosa Abraham, assistant professor at the Center for Sustainable Employment at Azim. Premji University in Bengaluru city.

For 22-year-old Pradeep Gupta, who hopes to land a public sector job, working in the private sector is the “last resort”.

“There is honor, job security and less pressure” in a government job, he said, speaking in the Uttar Pradesh city of Prayagraj, a thriving school hub with a large number of schools.

Nearly 5 million students applied for 60,000 vacancies in the Uttar Pradesh police earlier this year, and an examination for the post of constable in the central government’s security services had 4.7 million applicants for 26,000 posts.

Another that gives candidates a shot at positions such as office boys and drivers in government departments attracted nearly 2.6 million applicants in 2023 for about 7,500 jobs.

Across all levels of government, including the armed forces, schools, health services and the military, nearly 6 million jobs remain unfilled, India’s main opposition party, the Indian National Congress, estimates.

An email to the federal government seeking data on government jobs and vacancies was not answered.

Good job

For Maroof Ahmed, who has been running a school in Prayagraj since 2014, this meant good work.

Currently, he says, his academy has five campuses, teaching nearly 25,000-30,000 students a year through physical and online courses.

Success rates, or those who land jobs, are low at about 5-10 percent, but demand remains high, he said.

No data was available on the number of such coaching institutes across the country as much of the sector is informal and unorganized.

The clamor for government jobs is as much about attitudes to work as it is about the state of India’s labor market, said Rituparna Chakraborty, co-founder of staffing firm TeamLease Services.

“The private sector is based on meritocracy and responds to economic ups and downs,” he said. “In the public sector, once you get a job, mostly regardless of your performance, your future is secure.