According to the NSS data (62nd Round, 2005-06), the unemployment rate was 5.26 for youth in the age group of 15-35years; and the work participation rate was 51.18. Youth more than any other group has to pay the social cost of globalization.
For youth, an important transition to work is to be meaningfully engaged in sorne work, and is financially independent.
Employment provides time structure, social contact, activity, status, purpose and control. Unemployment results in economic implications, physiological and psychological effects.
Women’s participation in the work force is interwoven with caste, class and gender hierarchies. The stage of transition from school to work, and, hence, unemployment is viewed as a serious problem.
Migration for employment is on the rise, increased migration to urban locations, leads to overcrowding, lack of adequate infrastructure, and creation of identity issues (insider and outsider).
Such a situation has other consequences such as increase in crime, substance abuse, mental illness and so on.
Globalizationand modernization have widened the scope of work and enhancing lifestyles (especially the urban middle class).
However, many existing crafts and skills are becoming outdated or irrelevant (computer skills, artisans).
In spite of a significant rise in new vocations and careers, students still opt for jobs and careers, which have a status and standing in society.
It is also seen that self employment is the choice of many youth, and due to lack of jobs to offer, the government’s emphasis now is also on encouraging people for self-employment (l’imes of India, September 18,2000, pg.1j.
One finds that skilled workers, like carpenters, farmers, blacksmiths, prefer their children to take white collar jobs rather than carry their trades.
The number of youth involved in the task of social reconstruction is very small. Today, expectations and aspirations for a consumerist lifestyle makes youth more ambitious and aggressive in career advancement.
“The youth see the private sector as modern, wealthy and professional; the civil service as highly social, classy, arrogant and corrupt; and the armed forces as macho, brave, caring, committed but leading an unsettled life.”
(The Times of India, May 27, 1995, pg.11). It is well known that in spite of constitutional and legal provisions (Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation), 1986) children and adolescents continue to be part of the work force.
There is not much data on adolescents and youth in the informal sector, such as the street youth, and this needs to be explored. The schemes offered by the Government include:
• Employment Guarantee Scheme (EGS);
• Aam Admi Bima Yojana – Social Safety net for unorganized people.
The World Development Report, 2007 mentions certain key issues which need to be kept in mind when managing the transition from education to work. These are:
• Starting work too early
• Breaking into the job market. “employment rates for youth are systematically higher than for older generations”
The family is considered the basic unit of the Indian social fabric. The primary site of regulation of behaviour was the joint family system.
This is characterized by common production and consumption; interdependence among the members with more emphasis on the family than the individual; and absolute authority of the head of the family (Verma and Saraswati, 2002).
Industrialisation, urbanisation, migration of population to cities, the spread of education, changes in the occupational structure and legal measures for the promotion of the status of women, are some of the factors affecting the family.
Thus, families have plurality of forms that are determined by class, ethnicity, geographical location and individual choice.
Youth are not only part of the family, but they are also in the process of forming their own family.
The Indian family still largely follows a system where the authority is determined by age, gender and generation status.
Decision making is by and large, still authoritative, rather than democratic or participative. Crucial decisions related to adult roles such as marriage or career are taken in consultation with or by the head of the family.
A majority of youth grows up in an atmosphere of dependence and few choices.
It is said that such a personality is dependent on others for decision making, hesitates to take independent responsibilities, and is Quick to blame others in the environment for his/her shortcomings (Gore, 1977).
Youth face a sense of anxiety between their duties’ and their individual needs.
An urban lifestyle demands greater initiative, a certain aggressiveness, a capacity to make choices, cope with tensions and take responsibility for one’s actions.
We have an increasing middle class with youth vying with each other for better education; higher salaries and work mobility, and maybe greater independence from their families.
The culture of cities breeds individualism, competition, consumerism and increases economic strains and the family unit also has to make changes and adapt to this new lifestyle.
Urban areas, today, are experiencing the first generation of liberal’ parents. Husbands and wives find new equations in marriage and attempt to be more honest and ‘liberal’ with children.
They have fewer expectations from their children, who are now mainly receivers rather than givers-a trait of a consumerist society. One could expect a more ‘self-centered’ group of youth with a different value system in the years to come.
A study commissioned by the Hindustan Times (January 26,2003) in five metros (Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, and Chandigarh) and one rural area, of young Indians in the age group of 16 to 24 years, showed that young Indians think very highly of their parents and see them as role models.
Thirty percent of the urban youth voted for their parents when asked whom they considered their role model.
Thus, the family continues to be a major transmitter of values, culture, behavior for the youth.
Next to the family as an informal system for inculcating education for life and living, the formal education system is a major socializing agent in the life of children and youth.
As per the 2001 census, the all India literacy rate for youth in the age group of 15-34 years is only 60.37%, out of which male is 81.05% and females 71.03%.
Progress among females is more than among males; and progress in rural areas is much more than in urban areas (Saraswati, 2007).
The level of higher education is also determined by the size of institutional capacity of the higher education system in the country. The size is determined by:
From 1950 to 2008, the number of universities have increased from 20 to about 431; colleges from 500 to 20,677, and teachers from 15,000 to nearly 5.05 lakhs.
The number of students have increased from 1 lakh to over 116.12 lakhs. (UGC, 2008).
Access to Higher Education
The access to higher education is measured in terms of Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) which is a ratio of persons enrolled in higher educational institutions to total populationof the persons in age group of 18 to 23 years.
While the enrolment rate at the aggregate level is about 11% in 2006-07, it varies significantly across the states and districts.
The GER is much lower in states of Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, M.P, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Rajasthan Sikkim, Tripura, and Jharkhand (UGC, 2008)
Education facilities are virtually a monopoly of urban cities and, therefore, a larger proportion of college students are urbanites.
However, there are an! increasing number of rural youth joining under graduate urban colleges and hence, most colleges have a mix of urban and rural youth.
More colleges have also been started in district towns thus enabling more youth to avail of higher education.
The quality of education received at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels differ tremendously and the standards are just not comparable.
Even though college education is becoming more accessible, the system itself contributes to class stratification due to differential access to higher education.
Gender and location also determine access to higher education.
Increasing competition and the poor quality of education has led to corrupt practices like capitation fees, mass copying and buying of marks. Some factors which force youth to drop out of education and training:
• Natural disasters (tsunami, earthquakes)
Lifeskills education is increasingly been introduced at the University levels to enable youth to build resilience and cope with the demands of modern society.
This has been defined by the WHO as the abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal effectively with the demand and changes of everyday life’.
It includes, personal skills, learning skills, awareness of the world; livelihood skills (UNESCO).
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