Changing Employment Conditions in the Rural Labour Market of West Bengal

The objective of this paper is to explore the structural changes of rural labour market in West Bengal and also to examine the main factors responsible for structural changes of rural labour market of West Bengal. This study is based on secondary data mainly from NSSO reports, Ministry of Rural development, Reserve Bank of India, Rural Wage Rates in India, Labour Bureau, existing literature, etc. The currents sets of data show some structural changes in rural labour market in respect of work force participation rate (WPR), employment shifts and types of employment in rural West Bengal since 1999–2000. There is declining trend of WPR for both male and female after 2009–2010 in rural West Bengal. Workers move slowly from agriculture sector to non-agriculture and construction sector emerged as one of the important sources of structural transformation of employment of rural labour market in rural West Bengal. There is also decreasing trends of casualization of labour force in rural West Bengal and this indicates good trend of labour market. Keeping in mind the state of economy of West Bengal, some important interrelated factors responsible to change the structure of rural labour markets are growth of Rural NSDP, changes in rural money wage rate, rural development programmes—MGNREGA—and rural labour migration. Labour market becomes more flexible and segmented due to the rural labour migration.