15m new jobs needed yearly: report
Maharashtra, Karnataka and Punjab top in labour laws

THE current employment elasticity in India is 0.15, which means that even if 100 million new jobs are created by 2020, an additional 170-odd million will be unemployed, according to the “India Labour Report 2006”.

According to the report by TeamLease Services Pvt Ltd released recently, the quality of labour force in 2020 is not encouraging—only 88 million people will be graduates. It also says that out of India’s 402 million workforce, only about seven per cent ended up working in the organised sector.

“The unorganised sector is completely outside the purview of most labour laws and this includes social security.

Liberalisation will also involve extending protection of labour in the unorganised sector,” it points out.

Labour ecosystem

The report further states that the need for creation of new jobs every year may be higher, at about 15 million per year against the current projection of 10 million per year.

The report has also ranked states on the basis of the labour ecosystem: labour demand, labour supply and labour laws.

The top three states in each category are: Gujarat, Goa and Himachal Pradesh for labour demand; Goa, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu for labour supply, and Maharashtra, Karnataka and Punjab for labour laws. Delhi, Gujarat and Karnataka ranked the best in the overall labour ecosystem.

“The silent majority of unemployed and unorganised labour (93 per cent of workforce) need a labour regime that chooses new jobs over existing ones, does not encourage the substitution of labour by capital and eliminates the disincentives of job creation in the organised sector,” TeamLease Services Chairman Manish Sabharwal said in Chennai.

Younger workforce

According to the report, India is the only country in the world, which is growing younger. Its working population in the age group of 20-59 years is 567 million in 2006, it says.

Teamlease, India’s leading staffing company in its labour report, predicts the labour force to be around 716 million by 2020.

Surveys point out that in 1999-2000, across all social groups, between 85 to 90 per cent of the unemployed are in the age group of 15-29 (Indian youth) in both the rural and urban areas.

In 2005-06,the report puts the manfacuring sector GDP at Rs 5,14,002 crore (advanced estimates) in current prices. Out of this, 32 per cent is accounted for by the unorganised manfacturing sector. — PTI