What 60,000 Questions in Parliament Reveal About Youth Employment in India

To answer that, the Future of India Foundation analysed the full text of over 60,000 parliamentary questions asked in the 17th Lok Sabha (2019–2024). Our focus was on understanding how elected representatives engaged with the issue of youth employment.

What We Did

We began by downloading every question raised in the 17th Lok Sabha – 60,548 in total. From this massive dataset, we used a carefully constructed list of over 299 keywords related to employment, skilling, future of work and youth policies to flag relevant questions. This yielded a preliminary set of over 10,000.

After a detailed manual review, we identified 8,190 questions that directly engaged with youth employment concerns ranging from job creation, recruitment and skilling, to the impact of artificial intelligence and gig work.

We then analysed this dataset across multiple dimensions: frequency, geography, party affiliation, age and gender of MPs and the themes and depth of the questions raised.

Why We Did It

India’s youth face a deeply uncertain economic landscape. Every month, nearly a million young Indians enter the workforce. Yet many either find themselves locked in low-paid, informal and precarious jobs or excluded altogether.

While this is a severe economic issue, it is also a democratic one. Employment is the primary way in which individuals access mobility, dignity and stability. If democracy cannot deliver on this front, it risks alienating its largest demographic.

Parliamentary questions offer a rare institutional lens to track whether and how our elected representatives are responding. Unlike debates or bills, questions can be independently raised by MPs regardless of their party or executive control. They provide one of the few unfiltered insights into constituency-level priorities.

We undertook this analysis to assess whether the parliament is attuned to the scale and complexity of the challenge of youth employment and to spark a conversation about how it can do better.

What We Found

1. Engagement exists—but it’s not a top priority

Over 88% of MPs (481 in total) raised at least one question on youth employment. But these 8,190 questions account for just 14% of all questions asked in the five-year term. This suggests that while the issue is recognised, it is not prioritised.

2. Maharashtra leads in legislative engagement

Maharashtra emerged as a clear leader in both the number and depth of questions. Remarkably, four out of the top five MPs who asked the most questions on youth employment were from Maharashtra.

By contrast, large states like Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh underperformed relative to their size – both in terms of MP participation and number of questions asked per MP.

3. MPs are asking about the basics not the future

The dominant themes were skilling, labour rights, vacancies in public institutions and access to credit for entrepreneurs. Flagship schemes like PMKVY and MGNREGA came up frequently.

However, when it came to future-facing issues like the gig economy, artificial intelligence and platform work, MP engagement was noticeably thin. Only a handful of MPs raised concerns around algorithmic bias, job displacement or digital exclusion.

4. Structural bottlenecks are being raised

Beyond schemes and data requests, MPs are beginning to raise deep structural issues:

• The rise in contractualisation and lack of job security

• Gender and caste disparities in employment

• Vacancies in public institutions and shrinking formal sector jobs

• Informalisation, social protection gaps and workplace safety concerns

These reflect a growing understanding that youth employment is not a siloed problem, it is embedded in broader questions of economic policy, institutional capacity and social equity.

5. Many questions seek publicly available data

A large proportion of questions were simply seeking information that should be easily accessible, such as the number of operational ITIs, district-wise placement data or vacancy figures in government jobs.

This suggests deeper issues: either data is not publicly available or disaggregated; or MPs lack access and training to use it effectively. It also raises the possibility that MPs are using questions to publicly flag issues for constituents—even when the information exists elsewhere.

6. Structural inequities are reflected in what gets asked

MPs from Scheduled Tribe (ST) constituencies asked a significantly higher proportion of caste-related employment questions, while women MPs raised more women-related questions as a share of their total questions. This highlights the importance of representative diversity in ensuring that all sections of society are heard in parliament.

7. Youth issues are not just for young MPs

Surprisingly, the most active MPs on youth employment were in the 40-44 age group, not the youngest cohort (30-34). The youngest MPs actually had the lowest average number of questions on youth employment, challenging the assumption that younger leaders are more attuned to youth concerns.

Why This Matters

At a time when democracy is under strain due to intense partisanship and polarisation, this analysis shows that there is still room for cross-party consensus and constructive engagement. MPs across ideologies are asking similar questions about vacancies, informal workforce, skilling and job creation.

Yet, without structural reforms in how parliament tracks, debates and responds to these issues, this engagement risks remaining episodic.

What Comes Next

The Future of India Foundation will track youth employment engagement in the 18th Lok Sabha, publishing an update after every session. We will also extend this analysis to gender issues as well as those pertaining to the Dalit community.

Beyond the data, the report makes a deeper argument: the impulse to serve the country has increasingly migrated into technocratic and philanthropic channels, bypassing the political arena. But politics is where national priorities are set and where collaborative action scales. Unless we re-anchor public purpose within democratic politics, even the best efforts risk remaining fragmented and limited in scope.

Consequently, this initiative is part of our broader effort to institutionalise the role of MPs and parliament in long-term development. It complements our YouthPOWER Index, which aggregates data from 17 government sources to generate district-level dashboards and youth action plans for elected representatives. We’ve built a working prototype in Rajasthan and are now scaling it nationally.

India’s youth are not asking for favours. They are demanding a fair chance at a decent life of dignity and meaning. Parliament must rise to this moment, not as a gesture, but as a structural commitment to democratic accountability.