An Enquiry Into Employment in the Organised Sector in India

The paper attempts to analyse the trends in the organised sector employment of India for the period 1961 to 2010. It is found that, employment in the organised sector, is in a state of decline, exhibiting a downward trend throughout the period of analysis. The era of socialistic growth pattern (till mid 1980s) was more favourable for the public sector development than the private sector. Despite this, the share of public sector employment has been modest, and decreased after 1990s. Employment in the organised sector was expected to surge in the post-reform period; however, the adoption of reforms has worsened its employment generation potential. The public sector exhibits poor performance in the post-reform era, while employment creation capacity of the private sector has not increased to the level expected, in spite of its broadened scope. Within the industry groups, manufacturing is the worst performer in both the segments. The services sectors, mainly finance and transport, helped generating substantial employment in the aftermath of the reforms. This holds true, however, in the case of private sector only.