The Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration has issued a notice to all local levels, directing them to collect details of unemployed people in their respective areas.

According to a letter issued by the Ministry of Labour, Employment and Social Security (MoLESS), the local-level governments need to prepare the list by August 23.

The government had decided to extend the deadline for a list of unemployed people by one month due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic on July 14.

The government aims to implement the Prime Minister Employment Programme and provide jobs to those who are enlisted in the unemployed people’s list.

The Ministry of Labour has already mobilised employment coordinators for this purpose. The coordinators will collect data of the unemployed persons at the respective local levels, update it, and provide identity cards to the listed unemployed people.

The notice, issued on July 18, has asked local-level to collect details in coordination with the assigned employment coordinators. The government also asked the local units to use one of their staffers to collect such details where an employment coordinator has not been assigned.

The Prime Minister Employment Programme, launched last year, guarantees jobs for at least 100 days a year to the unemployed. The programme also ensures that all unemployed people will get 50 per cent of the minimum wage if they remain unemployed for 100 days in a year.

The amount that the government will provide to them will be equivalent to 50 per cent of the government-set minimum monthly wage of Rs 13,450 for 100 days.

Recently, the federal government had provided additional conditional grant of total Rs 3,032 million to 190 local levels for the implementation of the programme. The conditional grants have to be spent to ensure the employment of listed unemployed people.

Beneficiary identity cards shall be issued to the listed unemployed persons before assigning them to work in development projects. The projects where the listed unemployed will be working includes road construction, agriculture, irrigation, rural water supply, health, sanitation, education, forest and tourism among other labour-centric projects.

Last year, the PM Employment Program drew widespread flak for its lack of implementation as well as for making people pull out weeds from public gardens in the name of employment.