54 Lakh Indians Lost Jobs In Oct; But Hiring Surges By 43% As Per Govt Data

Around 5.46 million Indians from both formal and informal sectors have lost their jobs in the month of October this year.

Job Losses In October

With this happening, it seems that while pockets of the jobs market are cheering up, the stretch in the larger labour market continues. 

Although, the information technology, retail trade and education sector job creation numbers in October have upset the overall job cuts partially.

Coming to the numbers, the number of people employed in October was 400.77 million, which is down from 406.24 million recorded in September,  according to fresh monthly employment data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE).

Compared to September, both labour force participation rate and employment rate dropped month on month in October. 

At the same time, the national labour force participation rate (LFPR) climbed down to 40.41 percent which was 40.66 percent in September and  40.52 percent in August.

Here, the only saving grace is that the employed people universe expanded by over 712,000 in urban India in October against September as economic activities opened up in cities and urban centres. 

However, rural India faced a sizable fall of more than 6 million workers in both formal and informal jobs, as per the CMIE data showed.

Increase In Hiring Activity

In another development, hiring activity expanded by 43 per cent year-on-year in October driven by strong demand for technology professionals in Mumbai, according to the Naukri JobSpeak report.

With 2,523 job listings in October 2021, there was a 43 per cent year-on-year (Y-O-Y) growth. 

Sequentially, there has been an 8.35 per cent decline as the total number of job listings was 2,753 on the portal in the previous month. 

Here, the Naukri JobSpeak is a monthly Index that calculates and records hiring activity based on the job listings on Naukri.com website month on month. 

Further, this report mentions that demand for tech professionals continued to soar as the sector witnessed a significant 85 per cent Y-O-Y growth in October.