SRINAGAR: Chief Secretary Atal Dulloo today launched a Jammu Kashmir-wide baseline survey under Mission YUVA (Yuva Udyami Vikas Abhiyan) to identify approximately 1.37 lakh potential entrepreneurs and foster an entrepreneurial culture in Jammu and Kashmir. The initiative targets individuals aged 18 to 49 years, aiming to establish new enterprises that could generate around 4.25 lakh job opportunities over the next five years.
The month-long survey, jointly conducted by the Labour and Employment (L&E) and Planning Departments, seeks to create a supportive ecosystem for entrepreneurship while addressing challenges faced by existing enterprises. The effort will reach households across the UT, ensuring grassroots participation and comprehensive data collection.
At the launch event, which was attended by Vice Chancellors of universities, senior officials from various departments, and representatives from institutions such as IIT Jammu and NABARD, Dulloo highlighted the significance of empowering youth to embrace self-employment and entrepreneurship as viable career options. He stressed the importance of accurate and thorough data collection to lay the foundation for this ambitious programme.
Chief Secretary Dulloo urged Vice Chancellors and academic institutions to leverage the survey’s findings for research initiatives. He also directed the Labour and Employment Department to assemble an expert team, including faculty members from universities and national institutes, to develop an analytical framework that would translate the survey data into actionable insights.
He called on Deputy Commissioners to monitor the exercise in their respective districts and ensure swift resolution of any technical issues with the survey’s online application, developed by BISAG-N. Dulloo also underscored the importance of IEC activities to raise awareness about the survey among the public.
Further details of the survey were shared by Secretary L&E Kumar Rajeev Ranjan, who explained its dual objectives: identifying potential entrepreneurs and addressing the challenges faced by existing enterprises. A pilot survey has already recorded around 90,000 entries, with over 1,000 supervisors and 17,000 investigators trained to conduct the fieldwork.
This initiative represents a crucial step towards economic empowerment in Jammu and Kashmir, seeking to unlock the entrepreneurial potential of its youth while generating sustainable employment opportunities. Authorities have asked the educated youth to take advantage of this opportunity to get support to start their business and take the benefits under the scheme which includes a 25 per cent government subsidy, 5 per cent interest subvention, and an additional 10 per cent subsidy for women and physically disabled persons for setting up business.
