397.9
Mapping the Social Policy Issues of Unemployed Youth: A Case Study of Kashmiri Youth
Young people today have emerged as a distinctive social category comprising the major chunk of the global population. Their emergence as a distinctive social category can’t be attributed to their numerical preponderance only but also to the fact that they represent an essential component of demographic dividend and must navigate far more of life’s crucial transitions in a short time frame than any other age group apart from their peculiar characteristics, needs, socio-psychological traits and patterns of behaviour. Though, the problems encountered by the youth as a generalized category is due to youth of state of Jammu and Kashmir as well, however, youth in Kashmir being a conflict ridden zone assume a special importance given their severe victimization in terms of their lives, career opportunities and subsistence. Turmoil has lent a momentum to the ever increasing toll of miseries of youth by blunting the already limited available incentives and, hence, the life chances due to them. This has created a burgeoning problem of unemployment as a result of which educated youth are in dilemma. This has created a heightened sense of insecurity among the youth, who face multiple problems on socio-economic front.
Based on the primary and secondary inputs, the present paper shall focus on the scenario of youth unemployment in Kashmir, the attendant problems , attitudes of unemployed youth besides evaluating the efficacy of maiden employment policy in vogue in the form of “Sher-e-Kashmir Employment Welfare Programme for the Youth”. Finally, specific recommendations based on the various findings of the study shall be put forth for policy makers in order to curb the burgeoning problem of unemployment in the state apart from various suggestive measures for the improvement of various youth centric policies in vogue.