SPECIAL INITIATIVES AND BUDGETARY SUPPORT FOR EMPLOYMENT OF SC, ST, OBC AND MINORITIES

Newdelhi:21/7/25:The budgetary allocations under the different schemes of Ministry of Labour & Employment, inter alia, including the allocation for Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and Minority Communities during the financial year 2025-26 are given at Annexure.

Further, Ministry of Labour and Employment is implementing the “Welfare of SC/ST Jobseekers Scheme” through a network of 25 National Career Service Centres for SC/ST. The objective of the scheme is to enhance the employability of SC/ST job seekers through vocational guidance, career counselling, computer training, pre-recruitment training, etc. For the year 2025-26, Rs. 20.61 Crore has been allocated under the scheme. Regular meetings are conducted with all the implementing agencies for monitoring these schemes.

The Number of SC, ST, and OBC Jobseekers (including semi-skilled & unskilled) registered with Employment Exchange (in thousand) are as below:

Employment generation coupled with improving employability of all sections of society is a priority of the Government.

To foster youth employment in particular, the Union Government has recently approved the Employment Linked Incentive (ELI) Scheme to support employment generation, enhance employability, and social security across all sectors, with special focus on the manufacturing sector. Under the Scheme, while the first-time employees can get one month’s wage (up to Rs. 15,000/-), the employers can get incentives for a period of two years for generating additional employment, with extended benefits for another two years for the manufacturing sector.

The ELI Scheme was announced in the Union Budget 2024-25 as part of PM’s package of five schemes to facilitate employment, skilling and other opportunities for 4.1 Crore youth with a total budget outlay of Rs. 2 Lakh Crore. With an outlay of Rs 99,446 Crore, the ELI Scheme aims to incentivize the creation of more than 3.5 Crore jobs (with 1.92 crore jobs for first timers) in the country, over 2 years. With ELI Scheme,

The government intends to catalyze job creation in all sectors, particularly in the manufacturing sector.

The Ministry of Minority Affairs (MoMA) is implementing various skilling and education schemes for Socio-economic development of minorities to make them employment-ready. Pradhan Mantri Virasat Ka Samvardhan (PM VIKAS) is a flagship Scheme of MoMA, which converges five erstwhile schemes and focuses on upliftment of minorities through Skill development: entrepreneurship and leadership of minority women; and education support for school dropouts. A budgetary allocation of Rs. 267.29 crores for the FY 2025-26 has been made for the PM VIKAS scheme. The scheme has a robust monitoring mechanism wherein the entire candidate lifecycle is captured on the Skill India Digital Hub (SIDH) portal of M/o Skill Development and Entrepreneurship.

Further, Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) imparts skill training (skilling, re-skilling, and upskilling) through its various flagship Schemes viz. Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY), Jan Shikshan Sansthan (JSS), National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme (NAPS), and Craftsman Training Scheme (CTS), to all the sections of society across the country.

The details of various employment generation schemes / programmes being implemented by the Government may be seen at:          https://dge.gov.in/dge/schemes_programmes.

This information was given by the Minister of State for Labour and  Employment Sushri Shobha Karandlaje in a written reply to a question in Lok Sabha today.