Govt to hire 10 lakh people in next 1.5 years: PM Modi

After reviewing the status of human resources in all departments and ministries, prime minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday directed government departments to recruit 10 lakh people in the next 1.5 years.

"PM @narendramodi reviewed the status of Human Resources in all departments and ministries and instructed that recruitment of 10 lakh people be done by the Government in mission mode in next 1.5 years," the prime minister tweeted.

Union home minister Amit Shah welcomed PM Modi's decision to direct all departments to recruit 10 lakh youth in the next 18 months. "The basis of new India is its youth power. To empower them, PM Modi is working continuously. PM Modi's directive to recruit 10 lakhs in a mission mode in all government departments and ministries in 1.5 years will bring new hope and confidence among the youth. Thank you PM @narendramodi ji for this," Shah tweeted.

This comes at a time when the unemployment rate also saw a significant decline to 7.12% in May 2022 from 7.83% in April 2022, according to the latest data released by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE). The number of employed people increased marginally by one million in May 2022, taking the total employment to 404 million (37.07% employment rate) from 402.9 million (37.05%) in April 2022, Fortune India reported earlier this month.

May was the second consecutive month of an increase in employment in the country; the increase was much bigger at nearly 7 million in April, CMIE CEO Mahesh Vyas said. The unemployment rate, however, had risen in April but declined across both rural as well as urban areas to 8.21% and 6.62%, respectively, in May. The country-wide unemployment rate was 7.83% in April, including 9.22% across urban and 7.18% across rural areas.

There is a big shift in employment from agriculture to industry and services in the last two months, Vyas added. "In April, employment in agriculture declined by 5.2 million. But, the industry added 5.5 million and services added another 6.7 million. As a result, net employment increased by a handsome 7 million in April. In May, agriculture shed a much larger 9.6 million jobs. But, industry absorbed 10 million and services another half a million," showed the CMIE data.