PM Modi constitutes 2 high-powered committees to tackle economic growth, job woes

New Delhi : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday constituted two high-powered committees to tackle the slowdown of the economy, investment and loss of jobs in the market.

The five-member Cabinet Committee on Investment and Growth includes Home Minister Amit Shah, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Road Transport and Highways and MSME Minister Nitin Gadkari and Railway Minister Piyush Goyal.

Another 10-member Cabinet Committee on Employment and Skill Development has been formed which includes Amit Shah, Nirmala Sitharaman, Piyush Goyal, Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, Rural Development and Panchayat Raj Narendra Singh Tomar, Human Resource Development Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’, Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, Minister Skill and Entrepreneurship Mahendra Nath Pandey and Ministers of State Santosh Kumar Gangwar (Labour) and Hardeep Singh Puri (Housing and Urban Affairs).

The decision comes in wake of reports claiming that India's unemployment rate was at record 45-year low. The latest data shows that joblessness has indeed touched 6.1 per cent in the 12-month period from July 2017 to June 2018.

The official data showed 7.8 per cent of all employable urban youth as being jobless during the survey period, while the percentage for the rural areas stood 5.3 per cent. (The unemployment rate is defined as the percentage of persons unemployed among the total the labour force. Nearly 10 million youth join the country’s workforce every year.)

The job promise was one of the biggest challenges Modi government had ahead of Lok Sabha Election 2019.