Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) Quarterly Bulletin: July-September 2025

The ‘labour force’ is the share of the population “which supplies or offers to supply labour for pursuing economic activities” and thus includes both employed and unemployed people. The labour force participation rate (LFPR) calculates the share of labour force within a population. For the quarter of July- September 2025, the country-level LFPR (as per current weekly status) for all age groups was 41.6 per cent – 57.5 per cent among men and 25.9 per cent among women.

The LFPR among persons of all ages was higher in rural areas (42.3 per cent) than in urban areas (40.2 per cent).

In this quarter, Bihar recorded the lowest rural + urban LFPR at 30.5 per cent whereas the highest LFPR was recorded in Himachal Pradesh at 55.9 per cent.

The worker population ratio (WPR) is “the percentage of workers in a population” where worker refers to anyone who has worked at least an hour in the seven days preceding the survey. The countrywide WPR among people aged 15 years and above as per CWS in the third quarter of 2025 was 52.2 per cent (73.2 per cent among men and 32 per cent among women).

Among those aged 15 years and above, the highest rural + urban WPR was recorded in Himachal Pradesh at 64.1 per cent while the lowest WPR was recorded in Delhi at 40.2 per cent.  The WPR among women was lowest in Delhi (11 per cent) and highest in Himachal Pradesh (55.3 per cent). Among men, it was lowest in Uttarakhand (65.6 per cent)  and highest in Gujarat (81 per cent).

The PLFS outlines the percentage of workers across the three categories: self-employed, regular wage/salaried employee and casual labour. Of workers aged 15 years and above in rural areas, 62.8 per cent were self-employed and 22.2 per cent were engaged in casual labour. Only 15 per cent workers were salaried or earned regular wages.

In urban areas, 49.8 per cent workers (aged 15 years and above) earned regular wages or salaries and 39.3 per cent were self-employed. Whereas only 10.9 per cent engaged in casual labour.

Overall figures (rural + urban) showed that a higher percentage of women (64.1 per cent) were self-employed than men (52 per cent). Conversely, more men (27.2 per cent) earned regular wages and salaries compared to women (21.3 per cent).

The survey also provides data regarding the distribution of workers across agricultural, secondary (mining and quarrying among others) and tertiary sectors.  In this quarter, of the total workers aged 15 years and above, 42.4 per cent (57.7 per cent rural and 6.3 per cent urban) worked in the agriculture sector. Around 24.2 per cent (21 per cent in rural and 31.6 per cent in urban) were engaged in the secondary sector. And 33.5 per cent (21.3 per cent in rural and 62 per cent in urban) worked in the tertiary sector.

Following the current weekly status approach, a person is considered unemployed if they have not worked even for an hour during the reference week but looked for work or were available for employment. The unemployment rate is the ‘percentage of unemployed persons in the labour force’. The UR for persons aged 15 and above was 4.4 per cent in rural areas and 6.9 per cent in urban areas.

The UR among women in urban areas (9 per cent) was higher than that among men (6.2 per cent). Conversely, the UR among women in rural areas (4 per cent) was lower than that among men (4.7 per cent). The UR among workers in the age group 15-29 years was also considerably higher – 13.1 per cent in rural areas and 18.4 per cent in urban areas.

The rural + urban unemployment rate among those aged 15 years and above in the July to September 2025 quarter was lowest in Gujrat (2.2 per cent) and highest in Uttarakhand (8.9 per cent). Among women it was lowest in Gujarat (1.8 per cent) and highest in Andhra Pradesh (10.1 per cent). Among men the UR was lowest in Gujarat (2.3 per cent) and highest in Uttarakhand (9.5 per cent).

Focus and Factoids by Shivansh Singh.