40% educated women jobless, Senate body told

The Senate Standing Committee on Planning, Development and Special Initiatives was informed on Monday that nearly 40% of educated women across the country were unemployed.

The alarming figure was in addition to the unemployment rate that had reached 16 per cent - contrary to the figures provided by the government.

In a meeting held under the chairmanship of Saleem Mandviwalla, the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE) informed that that 24 per cent of educated people were jobless at the moment, underlining that women made almost 40% of the unemployed educated population.

The term 'educated' refers to those who have acquired an undergraduate or graduate degree and are employable.

However, they feared there were more ‘hidden people’ not included in the figures considering that some people get themselves enrolled in M.Phil studies after failing to fetch a job.

"Some 80% of students are enrolling themselves because of unemployment and this number doesn't come in any count," the PIDE officials said, adding that, “Our aim is to provide employment opportunities to 120 Million youth/graduates of the country".

'M.Phil degree holders applied for a peon's job'

The Senate committee was told that at least 1.5 million people applied for a peon's position in a high court that was advertised recently. "Among those applying for the job included M.Phil degree holders," officials said.

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Saleem sought a reliable report on the exact statistics regarding the educated youth and unemployment in order to take concrete decisions.

However, the PIDE officials said that all such studies were being carried out broad as no research was being conducted at the government level.

The officials proposed to the committee that laws should be made to grant licences to hawkers in order to enable them to get a job, adding that it will create 20 to 30 million employments in the country.
The PIDE in their recent publications also proposed reform for the civil services on their incentives and costs.

The PIDE officials also debated on the criteria through which universities were registered in Pakistan, saying that, unlike other countries which enlisted universities through chatters, universities in Pakistan were being approved through a “flawed” bill introduced by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) which contained lacunas.

The officials lamented out of the total budget of Rs300 million earmarked for the PIDE, more than 90 per cent was spent on employees’ salaries alone.

The chairman committee sought proposals for reforms for the PIDE which it will discuss in the next meeting.(With inputs from APP)