Agnipath offers jobs to youngsters between 17.5 years and 23 years of age. The unemployment rate in this age group has risen from around 23% in 2017 to over 50% since 2020. Every second person who is looking for employment in this age group is unemployed, explains Mahesh Vyas.

The growth is particularly remarkable because it comes at levels higher than during the pre-Covid times, notes Mahesh Vyas.

This is one of the largest monthly increases in the labour force, observes Mahesh Vyas.

It would be larger than even in the pandemic year of 2020-2021, notes Mahesh Vyas.

What the labour market statistics of March 2022 show is India's biggest sign of economic distress, points out Mahesh Vyas.

This is reflected in an improvement in their sentiments as well, explains Mahesh Vyas.

A change in the desire to buy consumer durables is perhaps the most important indicator of an economy changing direction, explains Mahesh Vyas.

An overwhelming proportion of the unemployed declare their nature of occupation as students. In the quarter ended December 2021, 77% of the unemployed who were actively looking for jobs were students. This syncs well with another data, that 77% of the unemployed are between 15 and 24 years of age, reveals Mahesh Vyas.

Evidently, households see a brighter future after the Budget, reveals Mahesh Vyas.

Only West Asia and North Africa have a lower employment rate than India, points out Mahesh Vyas.

Eighteen months after the economy was battered by the Covid-induced lockdown, employment has not recovered to its pre-pandemic levels, points out Mahesh Vyas.

Households with only one employed person can be considered to be somewhat vulnerable. Their proportion is rising. Also rising is the proportion of highly vulnerable households with no person employed, observes Mahesh Vyas.

'We are today worse off today compared to where we were two years ago by as much as 43 per cent,' notes Mahesh Vyas.

The week ended October 17 was remarkable as it saw a fall in the unemployment rate. We have not seen such a level in any monthly estimate of the employment rate since March 2020, Mahesh Vyas points out.

Something seems to be working for Indian consumers. Yet, the Indian consumer expresses some caution this festive season, reveals Mahesh Vyas.

Of these 8.5 million additional people employed in September, 6.5 million were in rural India, reveals Mahesh Vyas.

In the past 12 months, since September 2020, the net cumulative increase in employment has been just 44,483. This is negligible -- just 0.04 million on a base of over 400 million jobs, reveals Mahesh Vyas.

Labour seems to have found employment as maids, cooks, gardeners, security guards and the like -- a transition that could be described as from farms to the kitchen sink, instead of farms to factories, observes Mahesh Vyas.

Casual labour, which is the type of employment provided by agriculture, yields much lower wages -- of the order of Rs 291 per day. Labour would not voluntarily shift to this lowest wage-rate sector unless it had no better option, observes Mahesh Vyas.

The steady rise through most of July implies a greater demand for jobs. And most of this demand is being met, says Mahesh Vyas.