New Delhi: States like Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Rajasthan saw a sharp increase in their unemployment rates in the year ending June 2019, more so among their young, data released from the Periodic Labour Force Survey showed.
These numbers are likely to worsen further this year, especially in states like Bihar and Rajasthan, which have seen an influx of their migrant workers from industrialised cities like Mumbai and Delhi due to the Covid-19 pandemic and the subsequent job losses.
An estimated 23.6 lakh migrants have returned to 32 districts of Bihar since 1 May when the Shramik trains started, according to state government estimates.
The overall unemployment rate in Bihar in 2018-19 was 10.2 per cent, as against 7.2 per cent in the year-ago period.
The other states and Union territories to have rising double digit unemployment rates were Delhi at 10.4 per cent (9.7 per cent earlier), Tripura at 10.1 per cent (6.8 per cent), and Lakshadweep at 31.6 per cent (21.3 per cent).
The overall unemployment rates also rose for states like Telangana, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Haryana at a time when the overall unemployment rate came down marginally to 5.8 per cent in the latest round of the full-year survey from 6.1 per cent the year before.
States like Gujarat, Goa, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, however, managed to reduce their overall unemployment rates by at least one percentage point.
Also read: IIP contracts by record 55% in April due to lockdown, but Modi govt says data not comparable
Unemployment rates among youth
The unemployment rate in Bihar was as high as 30.9 per cent in 2018-19 in the age group of 15-29 years, as against 22.8 per cent in the year ago period.
The unemployment rate among the youth in Telangana was 27.4 percent as against 23.3 per cent and in Andhra Pradesh, it was 18.9 per cent as against 16.1 per cent.
Haryana and Rajasthan also saw an increase in the unemployment rates among their youth at 22.1 per cent and 16.6 per cent, from 20.7 per cent and 14.3 per cent, respectively.
The north-eastern states of Arunachal Pradesh, Tripura and Nagaland and the Union territory of Lakshadweep also reported rising high unemployment rates for those in this group at 33.1 per cent, 30.7 per cent. 59.6 per cent and 70.3 per cent, respectively.
Among major states, the highest unemployment rate in this category was reported by Kerala at 35.2 per cent – but this was an improvement of 1.1 percentage points from earlier.
In this group, states like Gujarat, Karnataka, West Bengal and Uttarakhand managed to reduce their unemployment rate by at least 2 percentage points.
The overall unemployment rates for this age group across India dropped slightly to 17.3 per cent from 17.8 per cent.
The challenge
The rising unemployment rates reflect the challenges ahead for both the central government and state governments to meet the employment requirements of its young population.
The expected growth contraction in 2020-21 due to the pandemic is only going to make this task more challenging.
Also read: India could see millions pushed into extreme poverty due to pandemic: World Bank analysis