April 21, 2021
As the second wave of Covid-19 grips India, many states in the country have enforced local-level lockdowns. In several cities, including the financial hub Mumbai and the capital city Delhi, dine-in restaurants, hotels, malls, non-essential shops, recreational public spaces, and cinema halls are either shut or are running at a lower capacity. And like last year, migrant workers have started fleeing back to their villages.
This slump in economic activity brings bad news for India’s banking system, which is still struggling to recover from last year’s lockdowns. The new lockdowns could result in businesses as well as households struggling to repay bank loans, which will result in more bad loans piling on the books of Indian banks, warns global rating agency Moody’s India arm ICRA.
Fresh employment generation slows as 2nd Covid wave haunts economy
Fresh employment generation slows as 2nd Covid wave haunts economy
New employment generation in India has slowed down, according to provisional payroll data released by the EPFO. Experts suggest that the employment generation could slow down further if India continues to witness a sharp rise in Covid-19 cases.
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UPDATED: April 21, 2021 16:12 IST
Provisional EPFO payroll data indicates a drop in new employment generation in February. (Photo: Reuters/Representational image)
Fresh employment generation has started slowing down in India due to stalled economic activity in the wake of the second wave of Covid-19.
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For migrants, hunger deadlier than Covid Labour economists have highlighted how the loss of work and the absence of govt support are forcing people to leave their workplaces
Aslam Ansari has had no work for the past four days.
The migrant worker wants to go back home not for fear of catching Covid but to escape starvation.
The tailor and his family of six live in a one-room dwelling close to Kalwa police station in Thane, near Mumbai. On Thursday, the family from Dumri block in Giridih, Jharkhand, had rations to last just three to four days.
“Once the food runs out, we’ll return to Jharkhand. I have tried very hard; there’s no work now,” said Aslam, who worked at a factory, stitching clothes for small children and earning about Rs 15,000 a month.
Fresh lockdowns push India jobless rate to over 8% in first two weeks of April: CMIE
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Fresh lockdowns push India jobless rate to over 8% in first two weeks of April: CMIEBy
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Synopsis
As of March 2021, employment in India stood at 398 million, which is 5.4 million short of the 403.5 million employed in 2019-20 with the biggest loss among the salaried employees. CMIE estimates 9.8 million job losses in the salaried class with 76.2 million jobs as of March 2021 compared to 85.9 million salaried jobs in 2019-20.
States first imposed stringent restrictions, which eventually paved the way for partial or complete lockdowns.
The imposition of fresh lockdowns has led to increase in unemployment rate to over 8% in the first two weeks of April and has the potential of impacting over 120 million unorganised workers besides hurting the economic recovery process, the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy said.