United Front to create one million new jobs a year

Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda has asked Reserve Bank of India Governor Dr C Rangarajan to evolve an employment generating scheme in order to create one million jobs every year.

At a meeting with the RBI governor, along with leading bankers and senior managers of financial institutions, at Raj Bhavan in Bombay, Deve Gowda discussed various issues related to adequate credit flow to the rural and priority sectors so that India's educated youth can organise employment generating opportunities for themselves with bank finance.

"We want to make them job providers from job seekers," Deve Gowda said after the meeting.

The prime minister said the ambitious programme will be finalised within a month.

Deve Gowda said the programme is aimed at assisting the educated unemployed from poor families who did not have any collateral security or any means for livelihood.

The prime minister, who is on a three-day visit to Bombay, said he has some ideas of his own for the meaningful implementation of the scheme. "It is not borrowed from Harvard University," he quipped.

He said his government had decided to create a million new jobs ever year, as a gift for the 50th anniverary of Indian Independence.