Prime Minister Modi transferred ₹2,400 crore incentives to 1.5 million beneficiaries under PM Viksit Bharat Rozgar Yojana (PM-VBRY) at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi. Over 7 million jobs have been generated under the scheme so far, with 2 million new recruits completing six months in employment. Social security coverage expanded from 25 crore (19%) before 2014 to 94 crore (64.3%) currently. Over 2 lakh registered startups are active, and FTAs with 40 countries support employment growth.

PM-VBRY is a central government scheme targeting first-time formal job seekers by providing employment-linked incentives, primarily through EPFO-based subsidy transfers. The scheme directly addresses India's structural unemployment challenge by making formal hiring financially attractive for employers and rewarding workers who sustain employment beyond six months — a threshold designed to discourage contract manipulation and ensure genuine job creation.

What makes PM-VBRY significant from a GS3 perspective is its design architecture: it links employment incentives to EPFO enrolment, thereby simultaneously pushing formalization of the labour market and expanding social security coverage. This dual objective — job creation plus formalization — reflects a shift from earlier demand-side schemes (like MGNREGS) toward supply-side formal employment incentives.

The backdrop matters: India's employment challenge is not just about creating jobs but creating quality, formal jobs with social protection. The jump in social security coverage from 19% to 64.3% of population is a significant governance outcome, though critics note that EPFO enrolment data may include contract or gig workers with limited actual security.

For UPSC, this topic sits at the intersection of labour market reforms, social security architecture, startups as employment generators, and FTA-driven trade-employment linkages — all recurring GS3 themes. The scheme also exemplifies Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) delivery, a key government accountability mechanism.