The Wire Staff 
New Delhi: While addressing the nation on the occasion of Independence Day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said on Thursday (August 15) that doors of opportunities are wide open for the Indian youth around the world and after eluding for so many years after independence, countless new employment opportunities are now at their doorstep.
While PM Modi asserted that there are countless employment opportunities, several reports, including the India Employment Report of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) cautions policymakers about increasing unemployment rate in the country, particularly among youth, reported The Hindu.
Earlier this week, the ILO’s Global Employment Trends for Youth 2024 report had said that youngsters across the world are unable to find secure work and their chances of finding a job decrease as the income level of the country they reside in decreases.
The opposition too has been targeting the Centre over increase in unemployment rate and the unavailability of statistics related to employment figures.
The National Statistical Office of the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation would earlier release employment and unemployment surveys till 2011-12. But since 2017, the Periodic Labour Force Surveys (PLFS) replaced the Employment and Unemployment surveys, reported The Hindu.
The first PLFS found that the unemployment rate for educated males in rural areas, between 2004-05 and 2011-12, ranged from 3.5 and 4.4% which increased to 10.5% during 2017-18.
Similarly, for educated rural females, unemployment rate ranged from 9.7 to 15.2% between 2004-05 and 2011-12 which increased to 17.3% in 2017-18.
For educated males living in urban areas, the unemployment rate ranged from 3.6 to 5.1% between 2004-05 and 2011-12 which increased to 9.2% during 2017-18, reported The Hindu