Roots Over Resumes

After years of job rejections and personal loss, Shugufta Bashir turned to farming, and became a symbol of self-reliance in an unemployment-ridden region.

- Gowher Bhat

O na hot summer morning in Banpora village of Pulwama, Shugufta Bashir bends down to check her tomato plants. Her hands are covered in soil, her eyes focused.

A few years ago, she was filling out job forms and chasing interviews. Now, she runs her own farm, and makes a living from the same land her family once left idle.

“I didn’t plan this,” she said, standing near a sapling she planted last year. “I just knew I had to do something with my life before I lost it to waiting.”

At 25, Shagufta is part of a generation of Kashmiri youth raised on degrees and deferred dreams. She holds a postgraduate degree in history and a B.Ed., credentials that once carried hope of a steady teaching post.

That hope faded after years of unanswered applications and failed interviews.

The job crisis in Jammu and Kashmir is severe. According to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, the region's unemployment rate in 2024 remained among the highest in India, often topping 15 percent. The figures are starker for women.

“I kept thinking, maybe next month, maybe the next list,” Shagufta said. “Then another rejection would come.”

Around the same time her job hunt was faltering, her engagement ended. Two blows, one personal, the other existential.

She remembers the week clearly: her phone silent, her inbox full of forms and regrets. Something in her snapped. Then something else clicked.

“My house looks out onto the fields. That land was always there, just part of the background,” she said. “One day, I thought, what if it's the foreground?”