By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has launched the country’s first National Youth Employment Policy, unveiling a raft of measures intended to tackle chronic joblessness among young people while conceding that Pakistan remains “still far” from the social welfare state its founders envisaged.
Speaking in Islamabad on Wednesday at an event to mark International Youth Day, Sharif announced that women would be guaranteed 35 percent of positions created under the new policy, with a further 10 percent of opportunities reserved annually for youth-led startups. The measures, he said, were designed to widen access to the labour market and encourage entrepreneurship among a population in which young people make up the overwhelming majority.
The policy was one of several initiatives launched at the ceremony, alongside a Power Sector Innovation Programme and a Skills Ambassador Programme, as the government sought to position itself as responsive to the frustrations of a generation that has long complained of limited opportunity.
Addressing the gathering, which included students from the Danish Schools network established under his previous tenure as Punjab’s chief minister, Mr Sharif was unusually candid about the gap between Pakistan’s founding ideals and its present reality. He said the country had been conceived as one in which education, health and opportunity would be available to all on the basis of merit and hard work, rather than privilege — and that this promise remained unmet.
“How unfortunate is it that, on the one hand, there is a Pakistan for the children of the elite, who not only receive the best education in Pakistan but also attend the best international institutions in the UK and North America,” he said. “Contrastingly, there is another Pakistan where millions of parents’ children, who desperately want an education, are not provided even basic educational opportunities.”
He said the disparity in access to quality schooling between the country’s wealthiest families and its poorest was one the government was obliged to close, invoking the legacy of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Pakistan’s founder, whom he said had envisaged a nation in which advancement would depend on effort rather than inherited wealth.
A tech-driven push
Much of the prime minister’s address focused on preparing young Pakistanis for an economy increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence and digital technology. “Today is an era of AI, IT and technology,” he said, warning that without absorbing the latest knowledge in these fields, Pakistan’s youth risked being left behind by more developed economies.
He said the government would direct all available resources toward equipping young people with modern technical and vocational skills, and toward securing places for talented students at leading global institutions.
Among the flagship announcements was the establishment of a new institution, Danish University, to be built in Islamabad and expected to admit its first students next year. Mr Sharif described it as the country’s foremost university, with a curriculum centred on technology and admission based solely on academic merit; tuition, he said, would be free.
The initiative builds on the Danish Schools programme, which Mr Sharif first introduced during his time as Punjab’s chief minister to widen access to quality education in disadvantaged areas. He said the network was now being extended across the country, and pointed to the programme’s alumni — now working as doctors, engineers and teachers — as evidence of its success.
Turning to the students in the audience, many of them Danish Schools graduates, he said: “The largest part of Pakistan’s population is you. And if we could not give you essential skills, then we won’t be forgiven in this world or the next.”
Scholarships, laptops and a promise to the young
The prime minister confirmed that the government’s latest budget included dedicated funding for youth development. As in the previous year, 1,000 high-achieving students will be sent to China for training in agricultural sciences at state expense; for the first time, a further cohort of top-performing students will also be funded to study artificial intelligence and information technology in China.
Mr Sharif said 700,000 laptops had already been distributed to students nationwide on a merit basis, with a further 250,000 Chromebooks due to be awarded to high achievers this year. He acknowledged that the laptop scheme, first rolled out during his tenure in Punjab, had attracted criticism at the time, but argued it had since given large numbers of young people access to opportunities they would not otherwise have had.
He closed his address with a personal pledge to the students present. “Today, I, in front of the youth, promise that until Allah has given me the responsibility to serve the nation, I will do everything in my power for your prosperity and employment,” he said, adding: “Our ancestors built Pakistan in 1947, and the Pakistan of 2047 will be built by your vision and energy.”
Power sector and political tributes
Also addressing the ceremony, the minister for power, Sardar Ahmad Khan Leghari, said the government’s new National Employment Digital Platform would for the first time give young innovators in the power sector institutional backing that had previously been lacking. He said 30 million rupees would be awarded annually in prizes to winning entrants, with a further 1 billion rupees set aside over the next three years to help bring successful ideas to fruition.
Rana Mashhood Ahmed Khan, chairman of the Prime Minister’s Youth Programme, praised Mr Sharif’s record on education, citing the Danish Schools system and the Punjab Educational Endowment Fund as among his most significant achievements, and said his leadership was steering the country toward what he described as progress, prosperity and peace. “The world is talking about Pakistan’s progress today,” he said.
The ceremony concluded with the presentation of awards to a number of young Pakistanis recognised for outstanding personal and professional achievement.
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