India Sees Dip In Unemployment Rate: CMIE

With the economy slowly returning to normalcy, unemployment rate in the country is decreasing, a recent data provided by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy stated.

According to its monthly time series data, the overall unemployment rate in India was 8.10 per cent in February 2022, which fell to 7.6 per cent in March.

On April 2, the ratio further dropped to 7.5 per cent, with urban unemployment rate at 8.5 per cent and rural at 7.1 per cent.

The CMIE is an independent non-government entity that serves both as an economic think-tank as well as a business information company. It's research group has built databases on the Indian economy and private companies.

Abhirup Sarkar, a retired professor of economics at Indian Statistical Institute, said that though the overall unemployment rate is falling, it is still high for a "poor" country like India.

The decrease in the ratio shows that the economy is getting back on track after being hit by COVID-19 for two years, he said.

"But still, this unemployment rate is high for India which is a poor country. Poor people, particularly in rural areas, cannot afford to remain unemployed, for which they are taking up any job which comes in their way," Sarkar said.

According to the data, Haryana recorded the highest unemployment rate in March at 26.7 per cent, followed by Rajasthan and Jammu and Kashmir at 25 per cent each, Bihar at 14.4 per cent, Tripura at 14.1 per cent and West Bengal at 5.6 per cent.

In April 2021, the overall unemployment rate was 7.97 per cent and shot up to 11.84 per cent in May last year.

Meanwhile, Karnataka and Gujarat registered the least unemployment rate at 1.8.per cent each in March, 2022.

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