Ranchi
Seventy-eight per cent of Jharkhand’s population is dependent on agricultural activities. As per the State Bankers Committee, there are a total of 39 lakh farmers in the state. Obviously, such a large farmer population should be taken care of by the government. At the same time, there should be need-based recruitment of people to run this system. However, the ground reality is quite different. There has not been single recruitment in the state’s agriculture department for the past 31 years.
As per the statistics, a total of 3,913 posts are currently lying vacant in the agriculture department of Jharkhand. A total of 5,565 posts have been sanctioned for the department throughout the state, but only 1,652 posts have been filled so far. The most important post is considered to be that of the block agricultural officer. There are 260 blocks in the state, but 194 posts of agriculture officers lying vacant. Also, some more posts, including the block park officers, assistant research officers, plant protection inspectors, statistical assistants and divisional agriculture officers, have not been filled.
Apart from the Birsa Agriculture University (BAU), there are nine colleges in the state where agriculture-related studies are undertaken. “There has been no vacancy for us since 1989 until today,” said Anoop Kumar, a student from the BAU. “Looking at it, a total of 2,770 students have passed out until the 2019 session. A total of 345 students are enrolled in these colleges every year. What’s the use of opening these universities and colleges when there is no scope of employment? Thousands of agricultural graduate students are sitting unemployed,” he added.
As per Ibrar, another student, due to the vacant posts, the farmers are not able to get important information regarding soil, the seeds to be used, how to keep away the insects, and the various government schemes. If these posts are filled, all these issues can be worked out.
Unemployed students are agitating online these days. Just before the lockdown, the students also visited the state Agriculture Minister, Badal Patralekh. While the minister had assured them that a total of 1,885 posts are going to be recruited for very soon, but so far, there hasn’t been any progress in this regard.
Yet another assurance by the minister
On June 13, a delegation led by Congress leader Aditya Vikram Jaiswal was told by the agricultural minister that an immediate letter has been written to the secretary of the department to remove the irregularities due to which the recruitment could not have taken place. They would soon be removed. The recruitment process will be initiated immediately thereafter. However, the minister did not offer any deadline for the same.
Manisha, who is pursuing her post-graduation in agriculture from the BAE, said: “Not only the government, but also private companies are not hiring people. Even the university’s recruitment cell had been closed for years and only been resumed sometime back. Only four persons were placed at the IFFCO Kisan call centre. The Jharkhand State Livelihood Promotion Society was to come for placement, but that too did not happen due to the lockdown. Despite studying sincerely, a lot of students are sitting idle in the homes.”
“A notification for recruitments was released once in 2015,” said Priyanshi, another student. “We were very happy that something good had finally happened. But a little later, it too was called off,” she added.
When asked what has been the adverse impact on agriculture situation in Jharkhand due to these zero recruitments, Neelima Tigga, a farmer, said: “What would the students do after studying so much? No government has ever put agriculture at the forefront. While it is clearly visible that, in the coming time, only agriculture would drive the economy of a country. In such a situation, this newly- formed government of Jharkhand will have to pay considerable attention to the recruitment in the agriculture department.”
Jharkhand with the highest rate of unemployment in the country
RP Singh Ratan, the former education director at the BAE, said: “In Jharkhand, farmers are in the dire need of three levels of help. First, the number of officers or employees working along the farmers is almost negligible. For instance, there are only 12-15 employees who are working as village-level workers (VLWs).”
He added: “Once the efforts were made, 1,800 VLWs were recruited, but they were placed under rural development instead of agricultural services. The Agricultural Technology Management Agency (ATMA) too does not have any employees. The posts of agricultural scientists and lower-level employees are vacant throughout the state. Professors in agriculture colleges are numbered so the education imparted in such institutions would hardly justify the degrees. Besides, there are no proper lab facilities. A farmer should be adequately supported by research. So, it can be said that the prevailing situation is not conducive for the Jharkhand farmers.”
As per the 2017-18 agriculture budget of Jharkhand, 80% of the total agricultural land is under single-crop cultivation. Only paddy is grown in it, whereas 20 per cent of the land is used to cultivate vegetables and other things. In the entire state, only 13 per cent of the land is irrigated or has proper irrigation facility. The previous government had claimed that irrigation facilities have been provided in 30 per cent of the parts, but the government also admitted that cultivation could not be started in those places.
As per the recent survey by the Centre for Monitoring Indian economy, at present, Jharkhand has the highest level of unemployment in the country. The unemployment rate has risen to 59.2 per cent in May. The state government is trying to control this with the support of MGNREGA and agro-related industries. At the moment, the government should break this 31-year complacency by addressing the need of these students and farmers.
