Where are the jobs after graduation? Kharge's attack on central government

Congress President and Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjan Kharge on Monday accused the Modi government of failing on the education and employment front, accusing the country's youth of facing serious crises such as unemployment, expensive education, examination irregularities and delays in the recruitment process. raised several questions regarding the performance and said that "Modi government has ruined the entire path of young India from education to employment."
The Congress president said that as per NITI Aayog estimates, 8.7 crore Indians between the ages of 15 and 29 are neither connected to education, employment nor training programmes. He claimed that about 88 percent of these youths are engaged in domestic work. Citing PLFS data for July 2026, he said the country's youth unemployment rate was 15.6 percent, while among young women it was 19.5 percent. Mr. Kharge first questioned the employment opportunities for graduates. He said that the youth who completed their education by spending huge amount of money are also facing difficulty in getting employment. He asked, "Where are the jobs after graduation?" He claimed that graduate students account for 67 percent of unemployed Indians aged 20 to 29, while unemployment among graduates aged 15 to 25 is about 40 percent. "Families spend their savings, students take education loans and get degrees, but later find that there are not enough jobs," the Congress president said. He also questioned BJP's old promise of providing 2 crore jobs every year and said that if this promise had been fulfilled, 24 crore jobs should have been created in the country in 12 years. He asked, "What happened to the promise of providing two crore jobs every year?"
Mr. Kharge alleged that lakhs of vacant posts in the public sector are still unfilled and instead of permanent employment, contract and part-time work is on the rise. Referring to India's demographic dividend, he alleged that the government had failed to create the necessary conditions to turn the country's large youth population into an economic force. He asked, "Who is turning India's demographic dividend into a demographic crisis?"
He alleged that expensive and inadequate education, paper leaks, delays in recruitment procedures, widening skill gap and lack of quality employment opportunities have threatened the future of an entire generation. Stepping up his attack on the Prime Minister, Mr. Kharge also referred to the old claim in which he had talked about correcting decades of failures of previous governments.
Mr. Kharge said, "Modiji, you have promised what the previous governments could not do in 70 years, you will deliver." "You have certainly lived up to that claim, by giving an education policy that is expensive, influenced by the RSS, exams that young Indians cannot trust and degrees with ever-diminishing job opportunities," the Congress president alleged.