The Statistics Ministry has been left out of the “high-priority” economic policy group that includes the Finance and Infrastructure Ministries, for making presentations to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The Statistics Ministry is, instead, scheduled to make its presentation to the Home Ministry. The Statistics Ministry oversees the major sources for economic data such as the Central Statistics Office (CSO) and the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO).
The exclusion of the Statistics Ministry from the economic policy group assumes significance in view of the challenges lack of reliable data pose to economic policy-making. The importance of such data is greater, say experts, given the Modi Government’s focus on the economy’s revival.
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So, though revival of employment is a stated goal of the Modi Government, India does not have reliable data on jobs.
Unlike in developed countries such as the United States where joblessness data comes in every month, the NSSO conducts surveys on employment only once every five years. For the intervening years, economic policy makers use the same old data.