300 handicapped among aspirants who get lucky

Twenty-year-old Sunil was desperately searching for a job for the past four months and he was all smiles on Tuesday when he received the offer letter for a ‘Data Entry Operator’ from a private company.

Sunil, orthopaedically impaired, is a resident of R K Puram and was earlier working at a data centre to help his father run the family who is a labourer.
But the office closed down four months ago. Since then, he was frantically looking for a job.

He had a sigh of relief when he was selected by Data E-services company as an operator during the job summit organised by the Delhi government.  

“I am doing MA in Political Science from IGNOU. But I wanted a job while studying to support my family as my father earns a meager salary. I am so happy I got this job through this summit,” an exhilarated Sunil said.

Sunil was among the 2,108 candidates, including 300 differently abled, selected for various jobs in the capital during the job summit which ended on Tuesday.
The job fair started on August 3 to offer employment opportunities to the economically weaker section and differently abled and saw participation from as many as 30 companies.

One of the biggest successes of the summit was offering jobs to 300 differently abled people, out of the total 2,108, and giving them a renewed hope.

“We are a family of five and my father is a daily wager. My brothers are both in school and I am the only one after my father to support my family,” 20-year-old Hemlata, who was born with a disability in her right hand, said.

She was selected as a computer operator at a salary of Rs 9,000. Almost all those present at the Shah Auditorium on Tuesday for the concluding session had similar experiences to share.

“I was sitting idle for last two months despite having qualifications. Now, thanks to this job fair, I will be working with Bikaner Food Pvt Ltd,” Kishen Lal said.

Labour Minister Gopal Rai, while addressing the candidates and their families at the auditorium, said the employment exchange was just meant for registering people.
“We decided to change the role of the exchange and provide a platform to people. The government has done a new experiment by organising such a job fair,” Rai said.

“The job you have got will give new opportunity and increase your confidence level. This is our first attempt and after a year, we will organise a get together to get the feedback of employees selected in the job fair,” Rai added.

“In future, government will organise more such job summits so that unemployed persons.”

Calling it a “trust summit” and not just a job summit, he said this will enhance trust between people, companies and the government.

The thirty companies which participated in the summit include Vodafone, Minda, KFC (Yum Restaurant), Lemon Tree Hotels, Vishal Mega Mart, Pantaloon Fashion and Retails Ltd, Concentrix, Aegis, Data E-Services, Miraz Detective & Securities Services Pvt Ltd, LIC of India, Bikanerwala Foods Pvt Ltd, Assocom India Pvt Ltd etc.