Govt to conduct new survey on employment, says Debroy

The government will conduct a new national sample survey on employment, which will show that there has been "substantial job creation", prime minister's economic advisory council chief Bibek Debroy said Friday.

Amid a raging controversy over employment data, Debroy also said states are largely responsible for creating "business environment" and jobs.

On Thursday, a media report based on the National Sample Survey Office's (NSSO) periodic labour force survey, said unemployment rate had hit a 45-year high of 6.1 per cent in 2017-18. However, the same day, the government said it had not finalised the survey on labour force.

"We will have a new round of the NSS which will soon be announced and I am sure that that particular survey will show that there has been substantial employment and substantial job creation," Debroy, who is the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM) chairman, said.

In a video message posted on the Facebook page of Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Debroy also said a large part of what happens to "jobs, employment, the business environment is in the province of the states".

The EAC-PM chairman also pointed out that India does not have any robust statistical data on job creation after the year 2011-12.

Stating that India's labour force is still informal and unorganised, he said: "The enterprise surveys provide a very imperfect understanding of what is happening to employment in India."