Rural unemployment has nearly doubled in a week as lockdowns and surging Covid infections in villages brought economic activity to a halt. A lull in farming is adding to joblessness.

Rural unemployment shot up to 14.34% in the week ended May 16 from 7.29% in the week ended May 9, data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) showed. Rural unemployment is at a 50-week high: the last time it was higher was nearly a year ago, in the week ended June 7, 2020.

Similarly, urban unemployment climbed to 14.71%, three percentage points more than a week ago, while the national unemployment rate soared to 14.45% from 8.67%, highlighting a jobs crisis amid the second Covid wave.

Economists said the high infection rate and lack of employment opportunities in urban clusters due to lockdowns forced people to leave for their villages. But in rural pockets, there aren’t enough income opportunities. Besides, rural lockdowns and curfews have left people jobless both in formal and informal sectors, and a lull in farm activity in May is adding to joblessness.

In this edition of Big Picture we analyse the state of the Indian economy and unemployment in particular.

Anchor: Frank Rausan Pereira, Editor-in-Chief, Bharata First

Guests:
Ajay Shankar, Former Secretary, GoI... ///
Abhinav Prakash, of Delhi University... ///
Subhomoy Bhattacharjee, Consulting Editor, Business Standard... ///
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