India lost more than 10 million jobs in 2018, claims think tank

More than 10 million jobs were lost in India last year, according to Manish Tewari, a spokesperson for the Indian National Congress party, citing a recent report by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), an Indian think tank.

The number runs contrary to the claims of India’s ruling Hindu nationalist  Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) that the country’s employment is growing, and suggests that the BJP-led coalition government has not managed to deliver on its goal of creating 20 million new jobs every year, said Tewari.

According to the report, about 408 million people were employed in 2017, but that number fell to only about 397 million in 2018.

Based on the report’s figures, more than 80% of the losses were in women’s jobs, and more than 90% were located in rural India, said Tewari.

He added that the country’s unemployment rate has increased to 7.4% in December, 2018.