Hiring activity in India grows 16% y-o-y in March: Naukri JobSpeak

India Inc’s hiring activity recorded a 16% year-on-year growth in March amid removal of restrictions and a pick-up in business momentum prompting employers to strengthen their search for manpower, according to latest data from online job.

The Naukri JobSpeak Index for March stood at 2832 at the end of the financial year reflecting the steady growth of hiring activity in India.

March witnessed a sequential increment in hiring activity across all key sectors. Apart from travel & hospitality (82%), that has seen consistent growth since the travel restrictions have been relaxed, other key sectors that observed an uptick in hiring trends compared with last year are education (+44%), real estate (+30%), retail (+28%), BFSI (+22%), IT-software (+14%), and FMCG (+5%). Oil & gas (-6%) recorded a slight decline in March compared to a year ago, while healthcare remained flat. “India is on the road to economic recovery with all key industries and cities showing signs of continued recovery,” said Pawan Goyal, Chief Business Officer, Naukri.com. “It is good to see that sectors that were worst hit by the pandemic such as travel & hospitality have now revived. We believe that with a growth trajectory like this, the upward trend in talent demand will continue its dream run in the coming months,” he added.

The Naukri JobSpeak is a monthly Index that calculates and records hiring activity based on the job listings on Naukri.com website. The survey is based on data from more than 76,000 clients who use Naukri.com.

Metro cities saw positive on-year growth in hiring activity during the month with Kolkata (+42%) leading the charts followed by Hyderabad (+27%), Mumbai (+25%), Chennai (+24%), and Pune (+23%). However, Delhi saw a decline of 15%.

Among tier-2 cities, Coimbatore (+29%) registered the highest growth in hiring activity, followed by Kochi (+12%). While there was a dip in Chandigarh (-9%), Vadodara and Jaipur remained flat in March when compared with the same month last year.

Demand for professionals across all experience bands was steady in March with those with 16 years and above experience brackets witnessing the highest growth of 23% compared to a year ago. Hiring activities across 0-3 years (+21%), 13-16 years (21%), 4-7 years (14%) and 8-12 years (+11%) also grew during the month.