Why keeping youth discontent in check remains Indian PM Modi's biggest challenge

Exam leaks and a shortage of opportunities have sparked some of the biggest youth protests in years in India

Dharmendra Pradhan was forced to resign as India's education minister last month after angry Gen-Z protesters took to the streets over repeated entrance exam paper leaks.

His departure has allowed Prime Minister Narendra Modi to tide over an immediate crisis, but keeping youth discontent in check may well remain a long-term challenge for his government.

While Modi quickly announced fast-track courts , externalto try those accused in the leaks and appointed tech billionaire Nandan Nilekani to lead a government effort to reform the examination system, a more concerted effort may be needed to quell the anxieties of the young, who say they are losing patience with a system that's unable to offer them better livelihood opportunities or education that leads to productive employment.

"The labour market has become brutal in the last 10 years. Non-farm jobs have not been growing and real wages have stagnated," Santosh Mehrotra, a veteran economist and author of a new book India Out of Work: Rethinking India's Growth Story, told the BBC.

"India has a simultaneous problem. The economy is structurally weak as a result of which demand for labour is not growing. And our education system is so poor, that it is unable to supply new labour that is employable."

So far, rapid GDP growth fuelled by heavy state expenditure on infrastructure has been the government's default defence against criticism about the uneven nature of India's economic growth trajectory.

But the upheaval of the last month may finally push them to confront the crisis in education and the challenge of youth unemployment, say experts.

The "unprecedented growth in India's welfare state", particularly direct cash transfers, is an indication, Mehrotra says, that at least privately the government has recognised the problem.

India's Gen-Z protests forced the country's education minister to resign last month

India has the world's largest youth population with over 360 million people between the ages of 15 and 29.

There's been great progress in education enrolment and the number of private colleges and vocational training institutes have gone up exponentially in the last two decades.

However, "the transition from education to employment remains a major challenge, particularly for graduates", according to the State of Working India 2026 report , externalfrom Azim Premji University.

Unemployment rates among the young are nearly four times higher than the non-youth and also much higher than glo