Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann on Tuesday said the AAP government has given 36,097 jobs to the youth of Punjab in the first 18 months of its tenure.

Mann said merit and transparency are the twin pillars based on which jobs have been given to the youth across the state.

He was speaking at a function where he handed over recruitment letters to 249 youths for various posts, including 191 in Local Government Department, 25 in Animal Husbandry, 24 in Cooperation and nine in Technical Education.

On youths moving abroad in search of jobs, the chief minister said the trend started in the state due to the poor performance of the previous governments.

He said these leaders never bothered to give jobs to the youth of the state and due to this, youngsters preferred to migrate to foreign lands.

However, the AAP government reversed the brain drain and created numerous job opportunities for the youth, he added.

A former finance minister kept saying repeatedly for nine years that the state coffers were empty, Mann said without naming anyone.

"When a finance minister says that the coffers are empty, then it demoralises the youth who feel they will not get opportunities," he said.

"Did I ever say for the past 18 months that the coffers are empty? Yes, there are leakages that we have plugged. We never say that coffers are empty," said Mann.

He said the newly recruited youths should ensure maximum welfare of the public so that every section of society is benefited.

The chief minister further said the state government will launch 'Schools of Eminence' on Wednesday.

The first such school set up in the state will be dedicated to people. These state-of-the-art schools will act as a catalyst in providing quality education to the students, he said.

AAP national convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal will inaugurate a School of Eminence in Amritsar on Wednesday.

Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Telegraph Online staff and has been published from a syndicated feed.