Independence Day – What it means to India's youth today?
India is celebrating her 63rd independence day. In these 62 years our independence, India became one of the world's largest economies in terms of growth. And also had great achievements in various fields. Starting form agriculture, manufacturing to services India achieved many things. To name few, Green revolution and white revolution in the agricultural sector, up gradation of our manufacturing sector with the latest technologies. And India became the global hub for various kinds of services like banking, information technology etc… Introducing liberalization, privatization and globalization in 1991 made the path to various developments in all the fields.
Apart from this we are far away from the developed countries like USA, UK, Australia, Sweden in terms of social security is concerned. Unlike the developed countries we do not have any Job security schemes in India. More than seventy five percent of the Indian population working under the unorganized sector, where there is no job security for the people. The NREGA 2015, under which government provide livelihood and security of the house holds in rural areas of the country, by providing at least one hundred days of guaranteed wage employment. This act to some extent serving the purpose, however, most of the rural population in various states yet to receive the fruits of this scheme. As our former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi mentioned, only 15 paisa is received by our poor people out of every one Rupee released from government to them. With the population of 1 billion it's always a decisive task for the government to implement public welfare schemes of this scale. For this the infrastructure of our country needs to be upgraded, and Banks place a vital role as mediators between the people of the nation and government.
Other than the above, there are few more problems deteriorating the future of our nation's youth. Ragging in India's educational system is widespread, yet ragging is far from being recognized as an issue under human rights by Indian government and Human Rights fraternity. Ragging, a colonial legacy is widespread in India's education. Various State Legislatures in India have been passing anti-ragging legislations, yet the issue is far from being resolved. Indian legal fraternity has yet to approach the problem of ragging from a perspective other than that of "crime." In the absence of any serious research to that effect, ragging is hardly recognized as an issue under human rights; human rights fraternities in India do not seem to bother about "ragging". The international and domestic human rights law protecting the right to education and guaranteeing human rights in education should be used as a corrective for all education strategies. And the other major problem is acid and vindictive attacks on women, causing severe damage to the women education in India. So to utilize the youth population for India's growth, first all these issues need to be addressed at the earliest. Proper education and health facilities to youth are the primary requirements. Government has to protect the youth from the evils like ragging and acid attacks on women. The combination of the educated youth with fire, and an experienced person will make a huge difference to the society like India.
-Narasanjee Polavarapu
