Kejriwal’s U-turn: from inflated claims of providing 10 lakh jobs in Delhi to ‘unemployment crisis will be top priority’

AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal addresses a public election meeting in support of party candidate Surinder Setia (left), at Hari Nagar in New Delhi on January 23, 2025.
| Photo Credit: Shiv Kumar Pushpakar

The Aam Aadmi Party’s narrative on the critical issue of jobs has undergone a drastic transformation ahead of the Delhi Assembly election, with the party releasing a video message on Thursday about the serious unemployment problem in Delhi and highlighting the crisis in poll rallies all week. This is the same party, however, that has spent the last few years claiming that “we know how to give employment” and “we have given 10 lakh jobs in Delhi”, promoting its record in poll campaigns across multiple States, including in Punjab in 2022.

In the nine poll rallies he has addressed this week, AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal said the unemployment crisis would be his “topmost” priority if the party comes back to power in the capital. “This time, my biggest focus will be on jobs, employment. Our children do not have jobs. Our children are educated, but are sitting at home,” Mr. Kejriwal said at an election rally in Patparganj on Wednesday night.

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“I have been going around a lot in Delhi and wherever I’m going, people are saying the same thing: ‘Please give us jobs, please give us jobs.’ I have put my entire team to plan how to give employment to every youth,” he added. “This will be my topmost priority.”

The AAP’s earlier claims of giving 10 lakh or even 12 lakh jobs in Delhi have been missing from Mr. Kejriwal’s poll speeches so far, except for a brief mention in a short video message on Thursday. Party insiders say they are highlighting the issues due to feedback from the ground that unemployment is an important issue in people’s minds.

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Missing Rozgar projects

In 2022, the AAP government in Delhi had named its annual Budget as the ‘Rozgar Budget’, using the Hindi word for employment, and promised to create 20 lakh jobs over the next five years. Almost all the projects announced under the Rozgar Budget remain non-starters, including a job portal called Rozgar Bazaar 2.0, which was supposed to provide 25% of the promised 20 lakh jobs.

The AAP government never presented any progress on the Rozgar Budget and it has been missing from the party’s 2025 election messaging too.

Previous claims that 12 lakh jobs have been provided have included 10 lakh jobs supposedly generated through the Rozgar Bazaar, an online portal of the Delhi government where private companies or individuals could post job openings.

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Job portal not working

A Right to Information request filed by The Hindu in 2023, however, showed that the Employment Department did not actually have any data on the number of people who got jobs through the portal. In its response to the RTI request, the government admitted for the first time that it had arrived at the publicised figure of 10 lakh jobs on the basis of “sample surveys” from employers, and had no hard data to back up its claim.

Interestingly, the Rozgar Bazaar portal has not been working for the last two years. Its proposed successor, Rozgar Bazaar 2.0, which was announced in 2022, is yet to take off.

“The original Rozgar Bazaar portal became non-functional over some payment issues and the plan for Rozgar Bazaar 2.0 portal is also stuck between two departments on who will implement it and it is not expected to start anytime soon,” a Delhi government official told The Hindu.

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Turf war

The Delhi government has not been holding any job fairs either, as issues were raised about money spent on previous job fairs, officials said. AAP leaders said that they had to organise job fairs on their own as there was no support from the government and blamed officials for intentionally blocking the job fairs and rozgar portals.

“They are creating unnecessary hurdles by writing baseless problems on the files for the implementation of the schemes despite funds being allocated in the annual Budget. They are acting like this as they know that we cannot suspend or even transfer them as the [Union government-appointed] Lieutenant-General has all the powers,” an AAP leader said.

In Delhi, unlike in a full State, the L-G has the final control over the transfer and posting of officials. Many government schemes have been affected in Delhi amidst an ongoing turf war between the AAP and the L-G.