Paper Details

One of the most critical socio-economic issues in India is unemployment since it has a direct influence on income, alleviation of poverty, consumption, productivity, social stability and sustained increase in the economy. Even though India has witnessed a rapid economic growth particularly in services, digital business, infrastructure, manufacturing programs and start-up activity, the creation of employment has not necessarily kept pace with the high and youthful labour force in India. This research paper examines the trend of unemployment in India based on secondary data in official and institutional sources like Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI), Ministry of Finance, International Labour Organization (ILO), Institute of Human Development (IHD), and World Bank. It analyses the trends in unemployment based on rural-urban place of residence, the gender, the youth, education and the nature of jobs. The results indicate that the official unemployment rate in India has decreased over the past years, despite bigger rates in the late 2010s to approximately 3.1 percent as per PLFS usual-status estimates in 2025. Nevertheless, it is not entirely resolved as unemployment among the young people, educated unemployment, unemployment in towns, informal employment, underemployment, and low quality of work is still a key issue of concern. The paper contends that unemployment has impacted the Indian economy in terms of loss of output, consumption, loss of tax revenue, dependency burden, poverty, inequality, wastage of skills, and strain on social welfare program. The paper suggests enhancing the manufacturing sector, which is labour intensive, enhancing vocational education, supporting micro, small and medium enterprises, increasing women working in the labour market, facilitating formal jobs and enhancing the labour market data systems.

Unemployment, Indian economy, PLFS, youth unemployment, secondary data, labour market, economic growth, informal sector