India’s Unemployment Rate in January 2022

The Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy recently released the unemployment report. According to the report, the unemployment in India was at 6.57% in January 2022. This is the lowest since March 2021. The improvement comes as the lock down restrictions was eased in the country.

Unemployment rate in January 2022

• The unemployment in the urban regions was 8.16%. It was 5.84% in rural areas. In December 2021, the unemployment rate in the country was 7.91%. It was 9.3% in urban and 7.28% in rural.
• Telangana had the lowest unemployment rate in January 2022. It was 0.7%. The second lowest was in Gujarat in 1.2%. the third lowest was in Meghalaya, 1.5% followed by Odisha (1.8%).
• Haryana had the highest unemployment rate, 23.4%. The second highest was in Rajasthan (18.9%).
• As of December 2021, the total number of unemployed in India is 53 million. Of this, the majority were women. Around 35% of the Indian population is actively looking for work. This includes 8 million women. Another 17 million people are unemployed. These people are willing to work if work was available. However, they were not actively looking for job opportunities.

Current Scenario

• The educated and highly qualified are ready to take low paying jobs. On the other hand, the uneducated are willing to take whatever work comes their way.
• Three – fourths of the workforce in the country is self-employed. They do not receive any social security benefits.
• 2% of the workforce have secure jobs. They receive social security such as maternity benefits, health care benefits, retirement savings scheme.
• 9% have formal jobs and access to at least one social security benefit.
• 45% of salaried workers earn less than 9,750 rupees.