‘We Are Not Beggars, We Are Trained Professionals Being Denied a Chance to Serve Our Farmers’
WS/VP Desk
Srinagar, Oct 08: For 18 long days, they have stood under the open sky not for wages, not for favours, but for a right they believe was snatched from them two decades ago. The unemployed agriculture graduates of Jammu and Kashmir, their degrees gathering dust and their dreams slowly fading, continued their peaceful protest on Thursday, demanding the rollback of recruitment policies they call draconian and unfair.
For many of these young men and women, the protest is not just a fight for a job it is a fight for dignity. A fight to be seen. A fight to be heard.
They are seeking the scrapping of SRO-433 of 2004 and SRO-442 of 2017, which they allege have systematically frozen direct recruitment to entry-level Gazetted and Non-Gazetted technical posts in the Agriculture Production Department (APD) for nearly 20 years. They want the ratio revised to 70:30 to restore a meaningful share of direct recruitment, and 100 per cent direct recruitment restored for the Junior Agriculture Extension Officer (JAEO) post — currently understood to be entirely promotional, leaving no door open for fresh B.Sc. (Hons.) Agriculture graduates.
Behind these dry administrative terms lie thousands of shattered hopes.
Over 5,000 graduates, postgraduates and doctoral scholars are jobless or underemployed, they claim. Some have watched their juniors in other departments get appointed while they wait. Some have crossed the age limit for government jobs while waiting for a notification that never came. Some have watched their parents grow old, still hoping to see their child wear a uniform of service.
“We have been protesting peacefully for 15 days now. The government must understand that this is not just about individual employment; it is about the future of agriculture in J&K. We are trained professionals being denied the opportunity to serve the farmers of this region,” a representative of the protesting graduates said, his voice carrying the weight of years of silent suffering.
Another protester, a young woman Shazia clutching her degree certificate, said, “I topped my university. I dreamed of working in the fields, helping farmers grow better crops. Today, I stand here with that same degree in my hand — but no future in sight. Is this what we studied for?”
A postgraduate scholar, who claimed he had cleared multiple national-level examinations, added, “My father sold our land to fund my education. Today, he asks me every morning — ‘Beta, koi khabar aayi?’ (Son, any news?) I have no answer. I have only silence.”
The graduates argue the prolonged recruitment gap has not only crushed the career aspirations of an entire generation but has also weakened the department’s field-level capacity — hurting agricultural extension, farmer outreach and scientific farming in the Union Territory. They say the farmers are the silent victims of this bureaucratic paralysis.
“Every day we wait, a farmer suffers. Every season we lose, a crop suffers. This is not just our loss — it is the loss of every farmer who needed our help and never got it,” said Junaid another protester.
Last week, Agriculture Minister Javid Ahmad Dar said the government was working to resolve the long-pending recruitment concerns, but an immediate solution was not possible due to litigation involving various categories of posts. He said the issue had been pending for years and the government had been working on it for the past several months, adding that groups involved in litigation had also been taken on board.
“Litigation is the main reason. We have been working on this for the last several months and are achieving success somehow,” minister Dar said.
But for the protesters, every passing day feels like another year lost. Every sunrise brings the same question: How long must we wait for a future we earned with our own sweat and study?
“We are not asking for charity. We are asking for a chance — a chance to serve the soil, the farmers, and the land we grew up loving. A chance to prove that our degrees were not wasted,” said a Saleem protester, his eyes fixed on the horizon.
As the protest enters its third week, the question echoing across the Valley is not just about recruitment rules — it is about whether the system will finally hear the quiet sobs behind the loud slogans.
“We will not go home until we have an answer. Not because we are stubborn — but because we have nowhere else to go,” said another, as the evening sun cast long shadows over the protest site.
