Job seekers' roll swells 46 pc in four years: Oscar

New Delhi, Mar 19 (UNI) Registration of job seekers in employment exchanges in the country has gone up by 46 per cent in four years, from 50.64 lakh in December 2002 to 72.89 lakh by the end of last year, the Lok Sabha was informed today.

Over the last ten years, around 58 lakh job seekers a year were approaching employment exchanges on an average for registration, Labour and Employment Minister Oscar Fernandes said in a written reply.

Employment exchanges with a network of 947 offices spread throughout the length and breadth of the country are providing free services to the job seekers and employers through various functions such as registration, submission of names to employers, career counselling, vocational guidance and collection of labour market information.

Functioning of employment exchanges in the country is, therefore, still significant, he said.

MNCs: No study/survey at all India level has been conducted by his Ministry to assess the impact of entry of multi-national companies (MNCs) on unemployment problem, Mr Fernandes said in reply to another question.

However, due to globalisation and economic liberalisation, some employment opportunities in the older type of enterprises might have been reduced due to decline in efficiency, but at the same time new employment opportunities are being created in a number of new areas such as IT, tourism, financial services, modern retailing and construction.

Employment opportunities in the country, on the whole, on usual status basis have gone up from around 374 million in 1993-94 to around 397 million in 1999-2000 and 459 million in 2004-05.

UNI