Casual workers PSUs hired fell 44% in first Covid-19 pandemic year

Experts say lockdown and near stalling of business may have prompted the decline

In FY21, when Covid hit, central public sector enterprises (CPSEs) employed 44.3 per cent fewer casual workers and 7 per cent fewer contractual workers than in the previous year, according to the Public Sector Enterprises Survey.

In the fiscal year 2020-21, about 29,273 casual or daily wage workers were employed by CPSEs compared to 52,553 in FY20.

Contractual employees of public sector undertakings (PSUs) declined from 516,657 in FY20 to 481,395 in FY21. In total, the 389 PSUs employed 1.37 million workers in FY21, down from 1.48 million in FY20. The rise in Covid cases in the country prompted the