Report claiming unemployment at 45-year high in 2017-18 not verified, says NITI Aayog

The NITI Aayog on Thursday dismissed a 'leaked' report which claimed the unemployment rate in the country is highest in 45 years saying it was not final and the data related to it was still under process.

NITI Aayog Vice Chairman Rajiv Kumar. ANI Photo

NEW DELHI: The NITI Aayog on Thursday dismissed a 'leaked' report which claimed the unemployment rate in the country is highest in 45 years saying it was not final and the data related to it was still under process. NITI Aayog vice chairman Rajiv Kumar the report is "not verified" and that the “data is still being processed". The clarification came hours after Congress President Rahul Gandhi attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying he promised two crore jobs, but five years later a "leaked job creation report card" has revealed a "national disaster". "Government did not release the data (on jobs) as it is still being processed. When the data is ready we will release it," Kumar said addressing a press meet, adding that it is not correct to take the data in the report to talk about joblessness in the country. "Data collection method is different now, we are using a computer assisted personal interviewee in the new survey. It is not right to compare the two data sets, this data is not verified. It is not correct to use this report as final," he added. The VC said the country could not have experienced a nominal economic growth 11-12 7% if employment didn't grow. Refusing to comment on the content of the news report, he said the government will release its employment report by March after collating quarter-on-quarter data. The National Sample Survey Office's (NSSO's) periodic labour force survey (PLFS), according to the Business Standard newspaper, states that unemployment was last this high in 1972-73. To compare, the unemployment rate in the country had gone down to 2.2 per cent in 2011-12, according to NSSO data. ALSO READ: 'How's the jobs', Rahul asks PM Modi over 'leaked' report on unemployment Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant, who too was present at the conference, said India is creating adequate number of jobs for new entrants, but "probably we are not creating high quality jobs". Two members -- including the acting chairman -- of the National Statistical Commission resigned this week, saying the government had not released the job numbers despite the commission's approval. The NSSO report was based on data collected between July 2017 and June 2018 and is the first official survey post-demonetisation. The news report further said that unemployment was higher in urban areas (7.8 per cent) as compared to 5.3 per cent in rural areas of the country. Earlier, the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) had stated that 1.5 million jobs were lost just in the first four months of 2017 -- immediately after demonetisation of old 500 and 1000 rupee notes. The NSSO job report was previously planned to be released in December 2018.