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By:

Rajendra Joshi

3 December 2024 at 9:20:26 am

The Warning Beyond NEET

The Jantar Mantar protests exposed the widening gap between education, employment and growth. The month-long protest at Delhi's Jantar Mantar may have formally ended, but the political and economic questions it raised will linger. Triggered by the NEET paper leak, the movement became a major expression of youth discontent. What began as a demand for a fair examination system became a broader indictment of an economic model that promises opportunity but increasingly fails to deliver...

The Warning Beyond NEET

The Jantar Mantar protests exposed the widening gap between education, employment and growth. The month-long protest at Delhi's Jantar Mantar may have formally ended, but the political and economic questions it raised will linger. Triggered by the NEET paper leak, the movement became a major expression of youth discontent. What began as a demand for a fair examination system became a broader indictment of an economic model that promises opportunity but increasingly fails to deliver employment. The government initially treated the protests as a law-and-order issue. That changed when the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the ideological fountainhead of the ruling establishment, publicly criticised police action and expressed solidarity with the students. The subsequent resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, withdrawal of criminal cases and RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat's endorsement of the integrity and aspirations of India's Gen Z transformed the political narrative. The issue had moved beyond examination reform to whether India's development model is serving its young citizens. The NEET paper leak was merely the spark. The fuel had accumulated through rising educated unemployment, declining confidence in public institutions and growing frustration among millions of young Indians. Education is increasingly seen as an uncertain investment rather than a guaranteed pathway to opportunity. Every examination scandal reinforces the perception that merit alone is insufficient, while recruitment delays deepen the belief that the system is failing those who have done everything expected of them. India has celebrated its demographic dividend for nearly two decades, projecting its young workforce as its greatest competitive advantage. But demographic dividends are never automatic. They generate prosperity only when education is matched by employment, productivity and rising incomes. Otherwise, they become demographic liabilities that breed frustration rather than growth. The evidence suggests India is approaching that inflection point. GDP has expanded impressively over the past two decades, yet employment has failed to keep pace. Employment elasticity has weakened sharply. During the 1980s, every percentage point of GDP growth generated roughly half a percentage point increase in employment. Today the ratio is estimated at about 0.16, among the lowest for major emerging economies. Growth continues; jobs do not. This disconnect reflects India's growth strategy. Public policy has increasingly favoured capital-intensive industries through subsidies, tax incentives and investment support. Such sectors contribute to output and productivity but generate relatively fewer jobs. Agriculture continues to suffer from incomplete reforms and low productivity. Manufacturing has not expanded fast enough to absorb new workers, while artificial intelligence and automation are reducing opportunities in occupations once regarded as gateways to middle-class prosperity. India thus faces a paradox: it is producing more graduates while creating fewer opportunities to absorb them. The comparison with Asia is instructive. Vietnam and Bangladesh have pursued manufacturing-led growth that has generated substantially higher employment relative to economic expansion. Vietnam's employment-to-population ratio is estimated at nearly three-fourths, compared with about one-half in India. Vietnam has also moved into the upper-middle-income category, while India remains a lower-middle-income economy. These comparisons do not diminish India's achievements. They highlight the urgency of correcting structural weaknesses before they become politically destabilising. History demonstrates the risks of prolonged youth unemployment. The Arab Spring showed how educated but unemployed youth can transform political landscapes. More recently, political instability in Bangladesh and Nepal has reflected frustration among younger populations facing shrinking opportunities. India's democratic institutions are stronger, and its circumstances are different. Yet no democracy can indefinitely ignore the aspirations of its largest demographic group. The significance of Jantar Mantar lies here. India's Gen Z is organised, digitally connected and politically conscious. Social media transformed local grievances into a national movement within days, while traditional political parties largely responded after the sentiment had acquired independent momentum. The RSS intervention further complicated the government's challenge. Once protesting students found resonance within the ideological ecosystem closest to the ruling establishment, the issue ceased to be a partisan confrontation. It became an internal warning that India's youth expect credible institutions, transparent examinations and, above all, meaningful employment. The Centre's examination reforms are necessary but insufficient. Restoring the credibility of competitive examinations addresses only one symptom. The larger challenge is to redesign India's growth strategy around employment. Labour-intensive manufacturing, support for small and medium enterprises, investment in skills, higher-education reform and greater attention to employment outcomes must become central to economic planning. The Jantar Mantar agitation should not be remembered simply as the NEET protests. It marked a moment when India's youngest generation questioned the assumptions underlying the country's development model. Governments can manage protests and reform examinations. But unless economic growth translates into broad-based employment, similar movements will return. India's demographic dividend remains its greatest opportunity. It could equally become its greatest challenge. The warning has been delivered. The question is whether policymakers are prepared to listen.

India’s Quiet Island Strategy

The Seychelles is rapidly becoming a small but vital hinge in New Delhi’s Indo-Pacific chessboard.

In geopolitics, even tiny island nations acquire immense strategic value by merley sitting astride the world’s most consequential sea lanes. Seychelles, an archipelago of 115 islands scattered across the western Indian Ocean, is one such place. Lying northeast of Madagascar and far from the continental clamour of Africa and Asia, it has emerged as a subtle but significant partner in India’s widening maritime strategy.


Seychelles is best known to tourists, not strategists. Its capital, Victoria, perched on the island of Mahé, serves a country whose economy depends heavily on tourism, fisheries and what policymakers call the ‘blue economy.’


Strategic Relevance

White-sand beaches, UNESCO-listed Aldabra Atoll, and giant tortoises project an image of timeless tranquillity. Yet beneath this postcard calm lies hard strategic relevance. The Indian Ocean’s shipping lanes through which energy, trade and data increasingly flow run close by. Whoever maintains goodwill in such places gains influence disproportionate to population or GDP.


India has understood this for decades. New Delhi’s relationship with Seychelles spans half a century, but it has acquired sharper geopolitical purpose in recent years, as the Indian Ocean becomes a theatre of quiet rivalry. China’s expanding naval footprint, its port projects across Africa and the Indo-Pacific, and its growing interest in island states have concentrated Indian minds. The result has been a renewed courtship of trusted partners.


The recent state visit of Seychelles’ president, Patrick Herminie, marked a turning point in this recalibration. Timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of diplomatic ties, the visit went well beyond symbolism. Meetings with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar produced a dense thicket of agreements, assurances and long-term visions.


The most eye-catching announcement was India’s $175m financial package, tied to the adoption of a joint vision for cooperation. India is positioning itself not merely as a benefactor, but as a long-term stakeholder in Seychelles’ development and security. Areas of cooperation range from digital infrastructure and tourism to fisheries, renewable energy and maritime surveillance. India’s experience in digital public goods offers Seychelles a chance to leapfrog administratively without surrendering strategic autonomy.


Unspoken Core

Security, however, remains the unspoken core. Seychelles occupies a key location for monitoring maritime traffic across the western Indian Ocean. India has already supplied patrol aircraft, helped build coastal surveillance radar systems and assisted in capacity-building for maritime law enforcement. These are modest steps compared with the grand bases and ports elsewhere but they suit both partners. Seychelles retains its sovereignty; India gains reassurance.


All this fits neatly within India’s broader MAHASAGAR vision - Prime Minister Modi’s articulation of a “free, open and stable Indo-Pacific” insulated from coercion and great-power overreach. Unlike China’s infrastructure-heavy approach, India’s island diplomacy is deliberately low-key: capacity-building rather than control, partnership rather than patronage. For Seychelles, wary of being drawn into larger rivalries, this restraint is attractive.


Economics reinforces strategy. India and Seychelles are keen to double bilateral trade, modest though it remains. Indian firms are being encouraged to invest in infrastructure, healthcare, renewable energy and port services. During the visit, Seychelles also agreed to join India’s Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure and to recognise the Indian Pharmacopoeia by facilitating medicine procurement at lower cost. India, for its part, pledged mobile hospitals, a full-fledged medical facility and emergency food assistance.


Cultural diplomacy has played its part too. People-to-people ties, bolstered by a Seychellois diaspora of Indian origin, have softened the edges of strategic engagement. President Herminie’s visit to Rajghat, paying tribute to Mahatma Gandhi, was a reminder that symbolism still matters, especially in relationships built on trust rather than treaties.


Protectionism, geopolitical fragmentation and unpredictable American politics have injected uncertainty into global trade and security. In such conditions, even small states matter more than ever. Seychelles’ consistent support for India’s role in the Indian Ocean and India’s steady investment in the archipelago’s stability reflect a shared recognition of this reality.


Can President Herminie’s visit be recorded as a turning point? Probably yes. Not because it transformed the balance of power overnight, but because it confirmed how India’s island strategy is maturing.


(The author is a researcher and expert in foreign affairs. Views personal.)


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