Karnataka is among the top three Indian states that created maximum jobs in the formal sector in the past one year since September 2017, the latest official data showed.
The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI), in its Employment Outlook Report — which drew mainly from the Employment Provident Fund data — showed enrolment of over 1.57 crore employees as new EPF subscribers countrywide during the September 2017-September 2018 period.
The data comes amid attack on the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government for not creating enough employment for country’s youth.
A state‐wise comparison showed that the top three states having the highest number of new subscribers were Maharashtra, which accounted for over 25% of new subscribers who had enrolled themselves in the Employees’ State Insurance Corporation (ESIC), followed by Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, taking away nearly 45% of the net new payrolls.
The data also showed that around 82% of the new subscribers were below the age of 35 years, bucking the myth that India’s youth were not being provided enough jobs.
Economic activity‐wise, the data showed that expert services, building & construction, engineers and contractors were the top three best-performing economic activities accounting for 72% of the net new subscribers.
The number of members subscribing to these scheme gives an idea of the level of employment in the formal sector. The EPFO and ESIC systems are based on returns filed by the employers electronically to avoid duplication.
In the absence of a robust official jobs data in India, the Centre had last year set up a task force under the vice chairman of Niti Aayog to suggest ways of improving employment data. The task force recommended that the MoSPI would come out with a consolidated report incorporating the details of new subscribers entering EPFO, ESIC and the National Pension Scheme.
The flip side is that the EPF and ESIC numbers are prone to revision as 1.02 subscribers have exited these payrolls during the past 13 months since the data started being compiled. But the yearly compilation has taken into account those who left and those who rejoined.