Degrees Lead Nowhere. Jobs Don’t Exist. Welcome to India’s Youth Revolt.

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Degrees Lead Nowhere. Jobs Don’t Exist. Welcome to India’s Youth Revolt.

Graduates are spending months cramming for long-shot civil-service exams, but their frustration is fueling anger toward Modi’s ruling party

By Stu Woo and Krishna Pokharel, WSJ

Nov. 12, 2026

Unemployment for Indian graduates age 25 to 29 sits at 20%, and hits 40% for those under 25, fueling youth anger over a lack of white-collar jobs.

MEERUT, India—Understanding the youth protests rocking India doesn’t require attending a demonstration. Instead, step into a windowless room with inspirational quotes on the walls.

At 9 p.m. on a recent night, three young men sat in cubicles in this study hall. They weren’t college students, but were among the millions of unemployed graduates toiling to pass government exams for a public-sector job.

With success rates often below 1%, this room has been their second home for months or even years. “There’s a reason to be hopeless,” said Akshay Tomar, a 26-year-old with a master’s degree in political science.

To Tomar and fellow Gen Zers, India has broken a fundamental social contract. In the world’s most populous nation, a college degree was supposed to guarantee a life that is better than that of their parents. Instead, unemployment for graduates age 25 to 29 sits at 20%—and for those under 25, it hits 40%.

Akshay Tomar sitting at a partitioned study desk in a library.

Akshay Tomar, wearing a green shirt, has a master's degree in political science. Stu Woo

Fueled by a private-college boom, India churns out graduates but not enough white-collar jobs to absorb them. Government roles make up a much smaller slice of the job market compared with other big economies, said Johns Hopkins professor Devesh Kapur. The dismal quality of higher education, he added, leaves young adults ill-equipped for other options like entrepreneurship.

The result is a generation spending years in these study halls, trying to beat the odds for the civil service. “Why do people buy lottery tickets?” said Kapur, who researches India’s political economy. “You vaguely know the house is going to win, but what is your alternative?”

The frustration threatens Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party, which has ruled India for more than 12 years. Their slipping grip on power is clear in Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state, which will hold regional elections early next year.

With 240 million residents and a disproportionately young population, the state is a BJP stronghold, its chief minister widely viewed as a potential Modi successor. In cities like Meerut, the party has counted on upper-caste, middle-class Hindus like Tomar.

The youth anger will likely dent the party’s results here, said Sanjay Kumar, a professor at the Delhi-based Centre for the Study of Developing Societies. While no one has solved the job shortage, Kumar said, “the real solution lies in saying upfront that the government is not in a position to create government jobs.”

Tomar hasn’t joined the protests because an arrest would kill his chances at a civil-service job. But that calculation changes if he hits the application age limits between his late 20s and mid-30s. “If I age out, then I’ll go protest because I have nothing to lose,” he said.

He sees the irony in desperately seeking to win a place in a system he finds broken. But the public sector offers more than just a steady paycheck.

“You have a chance for a better match and to get married to a better family,” he said, “so getting a government job can make a big difference in your life.”

‘The whole system is corrupt’

Tomar grew up the son of sugar-cane farmers in Shahbuddin Nagar, a village of about 1,000 people where childhood dreams look different from those in Western countries.

“We weren’t taught about the possibilities that you could be an astronaut, film star or app developer,” he said. “Growing up, we saw teachers, railway officials and bank officials, and we see they are doing well.”

Those public-sector aspirations were exactly what his parents wanted to hear. His father, Satender, had dropped out of engineering college to care for his mother, eventually turning to produce and dairy farming. He and his wife pull in $20,000 a year—firmly middle class in India—but he wanted his four sons out of the fields.

“There is a lot of hard labor,” he said. “I told my sons to pursue their livelihoods outside agriculture.”

The family sent Akshay and his older brother, Akash, to a public university an hour away in Meerut, at a cost of $1,300 a year a child. Both set their sights on a career in the civil service.

They knew what awaited them. Landing a government job means surviving a multiround test. Round one is typically four hours of multiple-choice questions.

The odds are staggering. When one state advertised 583 new positions to enforce alcohol regulations in 2023, more than 500,000 people applied.

After graduating in 2020, Akash spent years doing nothing but studying for some 50 job applications. Finally, as he was preparing for marriage last year, he gave up. “It had become too long a time,” said the now 28-year-old.

He settled for a private-sector job processing bank loans. It pays about $5,400 a year—above average for India, but less than half the pay of an equivalent government job—and lacks job security and healthcare.

Then came the spark for the youth protests in Delhi: Questions for the national medical-school entrance exam were allegedly posted online in advance, prompting officials to void the results. Modi vowed to swiftly punish the culprits and overhaul the system to prevent future leaks.

To the Tomars and many others, the scandal confirmed their suspicions that the privileged were paying gangs or bribing officials for sneak peeks at the tests that dictate the rest of their lives.

“The whole system is corrupt,” said Satender, the father. “That’s why the hardworking, genuine candidates suffer.”

Satender had previously voted for the BJP, but said he would rethink that support in the coming elections, or not vote at all.

But he doesn’t lay all the blame on the government for the situation facing his older sons. “They didn’t work hard enough,” he said.

Akash nodded, but Akshay pushed back, saying that may have been true once, but not now. “He wouldn’t know the work we’re putting in,” Akshay said. “Until you get a job, it will always come across that you’re not doing enough.”

‘It’s not worth it’

Across town from the Tomars’ alma mater sits the private IIMT Engineering College, Meerut. The annual price tag for Hamdan Nasir, a third-year computer-science major there, is roughly $1,700. “It’s not worth it,” he said on a recent afternoon. “The curriculum is old.”

IIMT didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Akshay Tomar said his public education was good. But since earning his master’s 11 months ago, he has lived in a monastic holding pattern.

He lives on an allowance of $110 a month from his family. Rent for a small apartment costs $27. Another $11 secures his air-conditioned cubicle at the study hall.

Seven days a week, a 10-minute electric-rickshaw ride drops him there around 8:30 a.m. He studies until 9 p.m., taking breaks to dine with friends and watch videos on his phone. The only full day he takes off is the one right before a test, having learned that cramming is counterproductive.

Tomar has so far taken 15 government-job exams, including for lower-tier jobs he applied for while still a student. He has advanced to the second round five times, but never to the final one.

His younger brothers skipped the academic grind to work on the family farm, a life Akshay doesn’t want. He also won’t settle for a private-sector job like his older brother. “I can see he eventually gave up and that he is not happy,” he said.

Despite the odds, he is betting on himself to secure a government job. “I can see a 90% chance of getting it because I’m giving 100% of the effort,” he said.