India's Job Market Paints Grim Outlook As Unemployment Hits 7.8% In March

India’s labour markets deteriorated in March 2023, resulting in a rise in the unemployment rate to 7.8%, a three-month high.

What Happened? According to data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, the country’s unemployment rate surged to 8.30% in December 2022 but decreased to 7.14% in January and increased again to 7.45% in February.

The unemployment rate in urban areas was 8.4%, while in rural areas, it was 7.5% during March.

CMIE managing director Mahesh Vyas told PTI that “the effect of this is compounded by the simultaneous fall in the labour force participation rate, which fell from 39.9% to 39.8%.” Vyas also noted that employment fell from 409.9 million to 407.6 million, resulting in a fall in the employment rate from 36.9% in February to 36.7% in March.

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Haryana had the highest unemployment rate among states at 26.8%, followed by Rajasthan at 26.4%, Jammu and Kashmir at 23%, Sikkim at 20.7%, Bihar at 17.6%, and Jharkhand at 17.5%.

In contrast, Uttarakhand and Chhattisgarh had the lowest unemployment rate at 0.8%, followed by Puducherry at 1.5%, Gujarat at 1.8%, Karnataka at 2.3%, and Meghalaya and Odisha at 2.6% each.

Rituparna Chakraborty, the co-founder of TeamLease Services, tells PTI that the unemployment data reflects a cautious mood in the current economic environment.

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