Across Kashmir, one can find highly qualified young people holding degrees such as PhDs, NET, SET, and JRF, yet many remain unemployed or underemployed for years. At the same time, individuals with far fewer academic qualifications may enjoy greater financial stability through business, skilled trades, transport, or other occupations. The real concern is that years of higher education often fail to translate into meaningful employment or social recognition.
Rayees Yaseen
The alarmingly low enrollment in several newly established Government Degree Colleges in Kashmir is not merely an educational issue. It is a reflection of a much deeper social and economic crisis. The problem does not begin with these colleges, nor does it lie solely with students or their families. Rather, it stems from a growing belief that academic excellence no longer guarantees a dignified future.
Across Kashmir, one can find highly qualified young people holding degrees such as PhDs, NET, SET, and JRF, yet many remain unemployed or underemployed for years. At the same time, individuals with far fewer academic qualifications may enjoy greater financial stability through business, skilled trades, transport, or other occupations. There is nothing wrong with honest work of any kind. The real concern is that years of higher education often fail to translate into meaningful employment or social recognition.
Young students observe this reality every day. They see graduates struggling despite years of sacrifice, while those earning well through other professions receive greater respect and security. As a result, many begin to question whether investing years in higher education is worthwhile. Some leave academics altogether, while others choose professional and technical fields primarily because they appear to offer better employment prospects.
This changing mindset has consequences beyond individual careers. Universities are not only places that prepare people for jobs; they also cultivate teachers, researchers, lawyers, economists, sociologists, political scientists, historians, and public intellectuals. These disciplines help societies understand their problems, improve institutions, shape public policy, and strengthen democratic debate. If fewer students pursue them, society risks losing an important source of knowledge and critical thinking.
Many young people also express frustration with recruitment delays, corruption allegations, and the perceived unfairness of some hiring processes. Whether these perceptions are fully accurate or not, they have a powerful effect on public confidence. When faith in merit declines, motivation to pursue higher education declines with it.
The result is visible today in the low enrollment of many newly established colleges. These institutions are becoming symbols of a larger crisis: a society where education is increasingly viewed as a poor investment rather than a path to opportunity and public service.
Kashmir does not need fewer educated people. It needs an environment where education is rewarded, merit is respected, recruitment is transparent, and academic achievement leads to meaningful opportunities. Only then will students once again believe that knowledge has value beyond a certificate.
A prosperous society requires entrepreneurs, skilled workers, doctors, engineers, teachers, researchers, and scholars alike. The goal should never be to choose between earning and thinking. A healthy society needs both. If education continues to lose its value in the eyes of the youth, the greatest loss will not be to colleges—it will be to Kashmir’s intellectual future.
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