The office of the Odisha Employment Directorate in Bhubaneswar. Telegraph picture

Bhubaneswar, Sept. 4: Over 10 lakh youths, who are educated but unemployed, have registered themselves with various employment exchanges across Odisha in the past 11 years.

Admitting the fact, the Odisha government, however, failed to give the exact number of persons employed during the period. This prompted the Opposition to demand doling out unemployment allowance to the jobless youths.

“As in other states, the government should give unemployment allowance every month to educated but unemployed youths till they get jobs,” said Congress MLA S.S. Saluja.

The government rejected the demand. “We don’t have any such proposal,” said employment and technical education and training minister Pratap Keshari Deb. “Nor had we promised this in our party’s election manifesto,” he said.

The minister said unemployment allowance was being doled out to jobless youths in states such as Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.

“So far, over 10.55 lakh unemployed youths have registered themselves with various employment exchanges across the state since 2001. Of the 7.41 lakh-odd job-seekers are young men, while the rest 3.14 lakh belong to fair sex,” Deb told the Assembly today.

Of the unemployed youths, 67,249 are diploma holders, 4,671, degree holders and 1,726 are management graduates.

The minister could not give details how many of the registered jobless youths had been provided jobs, saying it was not possible to know the figure, as the recruitment was not being made through employment exchanges.

However, the industries department, he said, in a circular, issued on November 24, 2009, had asked the industrial units being set up in Odisha to give priority to local youths at the time of recruitment. The department has been asked to recruit 90 per cent unskilled or semi-skilled workers from among the local youths, while the quota for skilled category has been fixed at 60 per cent. However, the industrial units were free to pick up senior and supervisory staff members from the open market.

Deb said the service providers were preparing a detailed guideline for the recruitment. “Consultations are on with various stakeholders,” he said.

Moreover, a target had been set to ensure employability for 10 lakh youths of Odisha in 10 years through the National Skill Development Mission, said the minister, adding that the state government was signing MoUs with various industrial houses for providing skill-development training.

Apart from the educated jobless youths, the matriculation dropouts are also being imparted the skill development training, he said.

The Odisha government has also set up the Employment Mission to jobs and self-employment opportunities. The mission has been organising nijukti mela (job fairs) at various places across the state, said the minister.