Bihar’s Crowded Trains Narrate a Tale of Soaring Unemployment

Bihar visuals highlight unemployment rates across the country

(Photo:The Quint)

Video Editor : Mohd Irshad Alam

Amid the Citizenship Act, NRC and protests in JNU and Jamia, visuals from Bihar – of overcrowded trains – narrate a tale of unemployment of the youth.

These visuals from are Bihar's Hajipur – students look restless. They had to appear for Bihar Police Sipahi Bharti examination. Since the examination centre was far and train fares are cheaper, they tried to travel in them.

In Bihar, for the position of Sipahi, which has 12,000 vacancies, there were over 12 lakh applicants. The examination centres are spread across Bihar.

Candidates Risk Their Lives for Examinations

It's a matter of their careers and they have to appear for the examination, no matter what. These images have been widely circulated on social media. Maybe they’ll stop being shared soon too.

Railway Stations Witness Chaos, Misbehaviour

But kin of Motihari’s resident Rajan Kumar will never forget this. This is because Rajan Kumar, who was going to take the same test, lost his life after being run over by a train on Gaya’s platform number 6.

This is not a scenario unique to Bihar. Across the country, youth is protesting against the lack of jobs.

Youth Grappling With Unemployment

About a month ago, in Delhi, several differently-abled youth protested for weeks. Braving the cold and the pollution, they stayed out at night. They claim that in 2018, there were recruitments for 60,000 vacancies in the Railways and that several candidates were selected but didn't end up getting the job. Their problems have, till date, not been solved.

In Madhya Pradesh, for the Patwari Recruitment examination, the results came out but recruitments have not been made yet.

In Rajasthan, the RPSC examination was conducted but the same treatment was meted out to students.

When you hear the woes of PCS students in UP, you get to know about the state of affairs as for the recruitment of 69,000 candidates, there have been protests.

No matter which state you go to, the chronology of recruitment examinations is the same.

‘Understand the Chronology’

For starters, the vacancies don't come out on time. Then, candidates go through the painful process of getting to the examination centre. They prepare for the examination but the examination gets delayed. They pass and get to know that the paper had been leaked or rigged. Even if the results come out, there is no reason to celebrate as there is no guarantee of when the recruitment will happen.

Overall, for a country where the highest proportion of the population is of the youth, there are no solutions for their problems The youth isn’t the primary focus of any political party.

All leaders hail the youth as the future of the country, but nobody seems to be interested in grooming said future. No matter if the government is led by BJP or Congress or a different party, the shoulders of the youth bear the weight of the parties' objectives, but when it comes to the problems of the youth, no solution seems to be in sight.

Now you see the demonstrations against CAA-NRC in many universities across the country. Students sit on the streets, get beaten up.

Demonstrations Taken Out When Future Is Endangered

Students protest when they feel that their future is in danger. They protest when their problems are not being heard. Take a look at JNU. The real issue of JNU has been lost.

All the talk shifted to those who incited violence. Nobody is talking about what happened to the students’ demand of revoking the fee hike.