Unemployment Rate In India Rises To 23.4% Amid Lockdown: Report

According to a report citing early estimates of jobs data, the urban unemployment rate in India has soared to 30.9 percent while overall unemployment rate stood at 23.4 percent at the end of the last week.

The damaging impact of the 21-day lockdown to curb the spread of COVID-19 have been surfaced by figures in a Livemint report that were based on the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy's (CMIE) weekly tracker survey that has been reportedly held steady for two weeks.

The report cited the latest data released on Monday by CMIE for the week ended 5 April wherein the research group's estimates on unemployment shot up from 8.4 percent in mid-March to the current 23 percent.

Based on a rough calculation, about 50 million people might have lost jobs in just two weeks of the lockdown, said Pronab Sen, a former chief statistician of India, as quoted by Livemint.