To achieve the Honourable Prime Minister’s vision of Viksit Bharat, India needs to create approximately 7 to 8 million jobs each year until 2036. However, India is facing an employment challenge with limited job creation in large industries and underemployment in agriculture, where 46 percent of the workforce contributes only about one-fifth of national income. At the same time, rural India is emerging as an important source of demand. Rural monthly per-capita consumption expenditure grew by 9.2 percent in 2023–24, faster than the 8.3 percent increase in urban areas. India’s large base of rural non-farm enterprises therefore presents an opportunity to create employment outside agriculture and enable rural economies to capture a greater share of the value generated by rising rural consumption.
