Mumbai, June 17: Over 6,000 people queued up outside the employment and self employment bureau at Nariman Point on Tuesday with the hope of landing a job with one of the 13 participating firms.
With companies looking to fill up nearly 2,000 vacancies, candidates, aged between 18 and 38, didn’t mind sweating it in the sun out while waiting for their turn in the serpentine queue.
While some of the job seekers were BSc, there were some who had not even cleared their SSC exam.
“Job melas are very popular and can be organised at a very low cost. Employers inform us of the vacancies in their organisations 15-20 days in advance and we match these with the profiles of those in our database,” said Rajiv Jalota, commissioner, employment and self-employment.
The melas are taking place in 17 districts of Maharashtra, he added.
Balwant Deshmukh, assistant director, employment and self employment (Mumbai suburban district), said that such job fairs are fast becoming a necessity given the global economic slowdown.
“We have at least 400 to 500 people visiting our office every day. After the SSC results are out, we expect the number to rise to 1,000 a day,” he said.
One of the companies recruiting at the fair, Vedanta Foundation, helped the employment bureau organise the event.
Not all who attended the mela were unemployed. Some complained that they were not satisfied with their current jobs and were looking for better options.
A girl with a BCom degree said she was unhappy with her private sector job, which, according to her, had few benefits and did not give her a bonus or leave.
–Agencies