The Youth Conundrum

India, a youthful country, consists almost a third of the population in their twenties. This demographic richness that India boasts of holds potential to turn the fortune of our country. Many powerful nations envy India for their demography as it can turn us into future powerhouse matching their might.

The enviousness of nations is not without a reason as India is famous for producing the greatest minds with many Indians heading the global companies. These examples inspire the youth of India to explore the heights of new success and be ready to put any amount of effort to reach it.

But such huge demography of the young population who aspires to lead a sumptuous life does not always result in everyone's dream fulfilled. The machinery of education system churns out graduates every year disproportionately to employment opportunities available.

Most of the graduates, except some universities and colleges, remains unemployed and struggle for months to years before getting their first job. The misery doesn't end here as the starting salary in private sector sometimes is not sufficient to pay for their expenses in a city and one needs to toil hard for a couple of years to get a decent paying job.

Many aspiring for a secure life goes for competitive exams to join government or PSU (Public Sector Undertaking) jobs thus entering a vicious cycle of emotional turmoil. Competition in India is so huge that every year only a few make out of it leaving most of them to struggle for one more cycle.

So, the question that arises in the young struggling minds is, "Do they deserve to go through all this?

Don't they deserve to have better employment ecosystem where all deserving youth who are ready to put any kind of efforts gets a comparable reward in return? They deserve to have enough job opportunities to show their capabilities and to propel the nation to new heights.

The key reason found in many surveys done to ascertain the reason for such unemployment is the skill gap. Our education system produces graduates who do not have sound skills matching to industry requirements. Our education system rather focuses on theory more than application, mugging up books rather than hands-on training.

One of the drawbacks that I personally observed is lack of financial education and business acumen in our curriculum both at a basic and higher level of education. Our education system needs to instil seeds of financial education and intelligentsia into young minds. Then only government initiatives like Start-up India can take off.

Huge responsibility to improve the present youth's condition lies with government think tanks who need to work on both the current job situation as well as reform our education system.

India is a gifted country in terms of its demography but its benefits can only be reaped when the government have a futuristic vision where young minds are nurtured well for future challenges so that dream of India becoming a Superpower in coming years is realized.