The Ministries of Agriculture, Skill Development and Entrepreneurship and Commerce & Industry may be a part of an expert committee to draft India’s first National Employment Policy (NEP), people familiar with the development said.
"During the consultation process for drafting the framework of the National Employment Policy, a few ministries like the Ministries of Commerce, Agriculture and Skill Development may be considered to be a part of the panel," said one of the people.
"DPIIT (Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade) will definitely be a part of the panel," the person added, requesting anonymity.
The committee will also include representatives of the labour ministry and other ministries and academia besides notable people from industry.
The NEP seeks to lay out a sector-wise strategy to improve the potential of job creation by drawing investments to employment-intensive sectors, policy interventions and attracting new industries by creating an enabling environment.
The NEP would take shape based on data from five all-India labour surveys and the recently launched E-Shram portal to facilitate evidence-based policymaking for employment generation. After following due processes and stakeholder consultations, the proposal will be sent to the cabinet for approval.
In September, the government had released the results of the first All-India Quarterly Establishment-based Employment Survey (AQEES) for the April-June 2021 quarter.
AQEES is among the five nationwide annual surveys conducted by the labour bureau, which functions under the ministry of labour and employment. The other four are the All -India Survey of Migrant Workers, All-India Survey of Domestic Workers, All-India Survey of Employment Generated by Professionals and All-India Survey of Employment Generated in the Transport Sector.
On August 26, the labour ministry had launched the National Database for Unorganised Workers or the E-Shram portal. It is a platform for registering an estimated 380 million informal and unorganised workers including construction workers, gig and platform workers, street vendors, domestic, agricultural and migrant workers, and other sub-groups of unorganised workers.
The database will facilitate the implementation of policies for the unorganised sector. It will help in better monitoring and supervision of government policies and ensure that benefits reach the targeted groups at the grassroots level.
The NEP comes in the wake of ballooning unemployment in the country. According to private think tank Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), In April 2020, the unemployment rate touched a record high of 23.52 percent when the country was under a nationwide lockdown for the Covid-19 pandemic.
According to the CMIE, during the April-June 2020-21 quarter, some 121 million jobs were lost, the highest ever monthly job loss on record since it started compiling employment data.
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