Unemployment in India rose to a 16-month high.
According to data from the Indian Economic Monitoring Center, India’s unemployment rate rose to 8.30 percent in December from 8.00 percent in the previous month.
For Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, controlling inflation and providing jobs to millions of unemployed youth is one of the major challenges ahead of the 2024 general elections.
The data further revealed that the urban unemployment rate rose to 10.09 percent in December from 8.96 percent in the previous month, while the rural unemployment rate declined to 7.44 percent from 7.55 percent.
Mahesh Vyas, managing director of the Indian Economic Monitoring Center, said the rise in the unemployment rate is not as bad as it seems as the employment rate rose to 37.1 percent in December, the highest since January 2022.