Bijay Charak
Jammu, Oct 7: Aiming to harness vast tourism potential of State, State Government had started diploma course in Hospitality and Tourism Management (earlier called as Diploma in Travel and Tourism) nearly nine years back with much fanfare, but astoundingly till date not a single post has been advertised by Government for these thousands of hapless diploma holders.
Sources informed Early Times that when the course was started in year 2004, its name was diploma course in Travel and Tourism but recently it was changed to Diploma course in Hospitality and Tourism Management. "During introduction of course State Government had made tall claims that State has lot of tourism potential with more than 1 Crore tourists visiting Mata Vaishno Devi Cave Shrine while more than 10 Lakhs visiting Kashmir valley every year", they said.
"The Government had given false hopes to many unemployed youth that State is lacking professional youth to cater needs of hotel and hospitality industry while starting this course", sources said, adding that thousands of students have so far completed the diploma course in Travel and Tourism but not a single diploma holder has been absorbed in Tourism department.
Castigating the casual approach of State Government, All J&K Hospitality and Tourism Management Unemployed Association, president Nasir Zargar said that so far Government has not advertised even a single post for these diploma holders.
"28 Tourism Development Authorities (TDA) have so far been constituted by State Government during last few years, out of which one dozen are functional", he said, adding, "Presently, the employees who are working in Tourism department and in these TDAs are non- professional and not diploma holders", they said.
"State Government had promised that when tourism infrastructure would be established, thousands of jobs for unemployed youth of State would be created in said department but it proved totally hoax", he further rued.
Zargar further said that recently Service Selection Board (SSB) had advertised six posts of Assistant Tourist Officers (ATO) at State level. "The qualification to fill the form of ATO was simple graduation, which was total injustice with diploma holders", he said.
He further questioned, "If Government had to recruit ATO through said eligibility, then why they spoil the future of students who have completed said course".
Pertinently, every year more than 250 diploma holders have been passing out from different polytechnic colleges across State, but their future is totally in dark as Government has not framed any policy for absorption of these diploma holders. |
