Piyush Goyal raises doubts over CMIE unemployment data, questions source

NEW DELHI: Railway minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday raised doubts on the unemployment data that Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) releases questioning the data source.

He said the huge number of applicants for government jobs like for railways does not reflect the extent of joblessness as these jobs hold great attraction even for those already employed.

Recently, CMIE, a think tank had claimed that unemployment had scaled a 27-month high at 7.38% as of December 2018. Responding to questions from the media, Goyal said, “We don’t know where the CMIE gets its data from. The CMIE started giving data from 2017 only. Before that, they had no reference points. So, while there is some traction of people talking from there, we still don’t know where or what is the extrapolation of data. That was also discussed today and almost the entire room and there was a feeling that there is no way to understand where those data are coming from...The CMIE data is completely at variance with either unemployment numbers or the data collected by the labour ministry or the empirical evidence of provident fund data.”

Goyal was speaking to reporters after participating in a brainstorming session organised by industry lobby group CII. He added there is robust mechanism in place to capture robust employment data, which includes huge numbers including from informal sectors and start-ups. Goyal said there was a unanimous view during the session that social benefits should be extended to people working in the informal sectors.

Recalling a recent instance of his ministry receiving over 15 million applications for a handful of job vacancies, he said, “Such data are often used to highlight the high rate of unemployment. But the sheer volume of people applying for government jobs in the country should not be seen as a sign of rising unemployment. It is the lure of employment security irrespective of performance levels that attracts people to government jobs.”

Earlier in the day, Union human resources minister Prakash Javadekar said people “who choose not to work” cannot be considered unemployed. “There is no system to collect data from the unorganised sector, the self-employed and a large section of the female population who do not work by choice. Are they unemployed? There are various aspects to this that need to be looked into,” he said.