54 SOCIAL SCIENTIST the per capita availability of cultivated land during the same reference period was much higher 'at 0.42 hectare in Punjab and 0.44 hectare in Haryana.3 According to the 1971 census, Kerala tops the list of states both in literacy (60.42 percent) and density of population (549 per square kilometre). More than 84 percent of the total population lives in the rural sector. Every year the rural sector gets swollen with literate young unemployed. An employment survey conducted in the state by the Bureau of Economics and Statistics revealed that there were about 1017 million chronically unemployed persons in 1977-78 of which 0.39 millions were estimated to be educated unemployed.4 The social service sector, which is well developed in the state, also offers only limited scope for further expansion and employment generation. Under these circumstances, an effective remedy to solve the problem of chronic unemployment may lie in the establishment of as many small scale industrial units as possible. It was with this in view that the government of Kerala launched the new industries programme in April 1975. Incidentally, it is relevant to note that, whereas the government of India started talking about the tiny sector in December 1977, the government of Kerala had launched such a programme as early as in April 1975. The three main objectives of this programme were: Consolidation and stabilization of the gains already made in the small scale sector by servicing and nursing the existing small scale industries units. Reviving the sick units, nursing them back to a satisfactory level of performance. Establishing 10,000 new small scale industrial units as a time bound programme.5 The industries department accordingly drew up a programme to establish 10,000 new industrial units and to revive 2,000 old and sick units in the small scale sector within a period of three years. A considerable number of these 10,000 units were to be set up in mini industrial estates (MIE) located in panchayats and the rest in municipal areas. Each MIE in panchayat was to provide for 10 small scale industrial units (SSI) and in municipal areas 15 to 25 units each. Similarly, an MIE in industrial towns was to accommodate 100 small scale units. The estimated number of units under the new industrial programme for each broad category of industry is given in Table II