2nd Wave Of Coronavirus Reduces Hiring In Metros: Growth Of New Jobs Down By 90%

As India battles a second wave of the Coronavirus pandemic, corporate hiring has been dealt a blow with job recovery halted in top Indian metros which account for a major proportion of white collar job recruitment.

The Figures

Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai had collectively posted a million job listings in one year, accounting for 40% of total overall count for the year. 

These major cities have seen a decline in the growth of service industry hiring in March. 

This data has been accumulated from sites like LinkedIn and other job portals where companies have posted job openings. 

Where hiring saw an uptick of 11% in the month of February, in March the figure stood at a measly 1% of active job count. March was typically expected to witness a boost in hiring, so this stagnation is a bad sign. 

Causes

Kamal Karanth, cofounder of specialist staffing firm Xpheno, has said that the recent resurgence in active Covid cases all across India and fears of looming draconian lockdowns have both contributed to a slowdown of the employment curve by 10%. 

This comes in just as hiring saw an incline throughout Feb and early March with 320,000 active jobs. 

Upon close observation it can be safely said that the hiring sentiment took a downturn in the later end of March since up until then total job openings stood at 290,000, 30,000 and 18% more than the previous month. 

All this can be blamed on the incoming second wave of the contagion along with the slow pace of the nationwide vaccination drive. 

Public sentiments questioning the efficacy of the vaccines along with reports of post vaccine infections have also contributed to the job slowdown. 

The Hardest-Hit

The sectors that have been the hardest hit include airlines, hospitality, large-format retail, entertainment and recreation which was just starting to recover as total reported cases in many regions saw a decline and there was optimism regarding vaccines. 

They are now once again on war footing as many regions in India have enforced varying degrees of lockdown. 

However industry experts are cautiously optimistic that this trend is only temporary and that companies are opting to be careful given the current scenario and will soon resume hiring in full swing. 

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