(10 April 2023) Government Data Roundup: Reports By MoSPI, RBI, Draft NCF-2023 For School Education Among Those Released Recently

The 26th edition of the fortnightly government roundup covers reports released by MoSPI, RBI, Ministry of Labour, draft NCF-2023 released by the Ministry of Education among others.

In this 26^th edition of the fortnightly roundup of government data, we look at some of the reports released by Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI), RBI, Ministry of Commerce & Industry, and the RBI. We also look at draft National Curriculum Framework released by Ministry of Education.

Payroll Reporting in India: An Employment Perspective – January 2023

About the report

MoSPI has been releasing this report since April’2018 and provides employment related statistics in the formal sector covering the period September 2017 onwards.  This includes information on the number of subscribers who have subscribed under three major schemes – Employees Provident Fund (EPFO) Scheme, the Employees’ State Insurance (ESI) Scheme and the National Pension Scheme (NPS)

Key Highlights

• During the period September’2017 to January’2023, 6.27 crore new subscribers have joined EPF Scheme.
• In January’2023, there were a total of 7.77 lakh new EPF Subscribers. Out of this, 5.8 lakhs were Male subscribers, and 1.97 lakhs were female subscribers.
• Highest number of new subscribers were in age groups 18-21 and 22-25 with 2.25 lakhs and 2.05 lakhs respectively.
• 3.53 lakh members have left EPF during the month of Janaury’2023, with around 1.77 lakhs in age group of above 29 years.
• 10.62 subscribers have re-joined EPF during the January’2023
• Total number of subscribers for Employees’ State Insurance (ESI) Scheme for the period September 2017 to January 2023 is 7.9 crores.
• In January’ 2023, the number of existing employees who paid into ESI was 2.79 lakh crores. There were 12.35 lakh newly registered employees in January’2023.
• During January’2023, there were a total of 70.2 lakh subscribers under National Pension Scheme.
• The total number of new subscribers to NPS in January’2023 was 59.3 thousand. Out of this, 12.3 thousand were Central Government employees, 35.3 thousand State government employees and another 11.7 thousand belong to corporate sector.

Basic Statistical Returns: Outstanding Credit of Scheduled Commercial Banks

About the Report

Basic Statistical Returns (BSR-1): Outstanding Credit of Scheduled Commercial Banks is published by the Reserve Bank of India. The report captures the various characteristics of bank credit. This includes – occupation/activity of the borrower, type of account, interest rates, etc. The report is compiled from the data reported by 90 Scheduled Commercial Banks (SCBs), with the exclusion of Regional Rural Banks. The report is made available by RBI on its Database of Indian Economy (DBIE) portal.

Data from Basic Statistical Returns (BSR) system is a key part of the expansion of the Indian banking system and financial inclusion policies since 1972.

Key Highlights

• The Year on year (y-o-y) Bank credit growth in December 2022 is 16.8%. A year ago, it was 8.1%.
• Double digit growth is recorded across all population groups.
• Personal loans account for over 1/3^rd of the incremental credit during 2022.
• Growth (y-o-y) in credit industry was 9.2 % in December 2022. Comparatively, it was 12.3% in the previous quarter. Meanwhile, the Working Capital loan growth (y-o-y) increased to 16.6% in December 2022, compared to 5.1% a year ago.
• In December’2022, female borrowers constitute 22.7% of the total individuals for whom credit was extended.
• Credit growth is higher among Private sector banks compared to public sector banks. Private sector banks accounted for 38.4% of the total credit in December 2022. It was 30% five years ago.

Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers – February 2023.

About the Report

The Labour Bureau of Ministry of Labour & Employment, compiles Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers every month based on retail prices collected from 317 markets spread across 88 industrially important centres in the country. The report is released on the last working day of the next month. The latest contains the index for the month of February 2023.

Key Highlights

• For February’2023, All-India CPI-IW increased by 0.1 point and stood at 132.7 points.
• Compared to previous month, it decreased by 0.08 percent. Even last year, the monthly percentage change was 0.08% for the same months i.e., January & February.
• Food & beverages group is the major contributor to the downward pressure. It contributed to 0.1 percentage point in total change.
• Year-on-year inflation for the month stood at 6.16 percent. It was also 6.16 percent for the previous month. Comparatively, it was 5.04 percent during February 2022.
• Food inflation was 6.13 percent compared to 5.69 percent in previous month.

Index of Eight Core Industries  

About the Report

Index of Eight Core Industries (ICI) is compiled and released by the Office of the Economic Adviser (OEA), Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

It is a production volume index that evaluates the performance of each core industry, both individually and collectively. They are significant and have an influence on other industrial activities. These industries in the order of their weight in the index are Petroleum Refinery Industry (28.04%), Electricity (19.85%), Steel (17.92%), Coal (10.33%), Crude Oil (8.98%), Natural Gas (6.88%), Cement (5.37%), and fertilizers (2.63%). These sectors account for a combined 40.27% of the weighted average of all the items included in the Index of Industrial Production (IIP).

Key Highlights

• ICI increased by 6.0 percent (provisional) in February 2023 compared to same period last year.
• There is an increase in the production of Fertilizers, Coal, Electricity, Cement, Steel, Refinery products, and Natural gas compared to February 2022.
• Earlier, the provisional growth rate for November 2022 was at 5.5 percent. This is revised to 5.7 percent.
• The Cumulative growth rate of ICI during April 2022 to February 2023 increased by 15.2 percent compared to the corresponding period in previous year.
• In respect to Industry wise performance, there was an increase in Coal (8.5 percent), Natural Gas (3.2), Petroleum Refinery Products (3.5), Fertilizers (22.2), Steel (6.9), Cement (7.3) and Electricity (7.6) in February 2023 compared to February 2022 whereas Crude Oil decline by 4.9 percent.
• In case of the cumulative period April 2022 to February 2023, there is an increase in Coal (15.2 percent), Natural Gas (1.5), Petroleum Refinery Products (5.2), Fertilizers (11.5), Steel (7.5), Cement (9.7) and Electricity (9.9) compared to same period last year. Meanwhile, there is a decline in case of Crude Oil by 1.6 percent.

National Curriculum Framework for School education -2023

Government of India released a “pre-draft” of the National Curriculum Framework (NCF) for School Education (2023) on 06 April 2023. It has invited suggestions from various Stake holders i.e., students, parents, teachers, scholars etc. NCF was last revised in 2005.

The National Curriculum Framework for School Education (NCF) is developed based on the vision of National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. It is aimed at addressing the education for the age group of 3 to 18 years across all the educational institutions in the country. NCF is across the four Stages in the 5+3+3+4 Curricular and Pedagogical restructuring of School Education as per NEP 2020.

Few of the significant recommendations in this draft NCF include:

• Play based pedagogical approach for children aged 3-8 years who would be enrolled in grades between preschool and class II.  Textbooks would be used from Grade 1 and most of the content would be in form of concrete materials like toys, puzzles, manipulatives etc.
• Grades III, IV, V is considered as preparatory stage and the children will be introduced to textbooks on languages, mathematics etc. The activity-based approach would be retained. Natural and social sciences to be introduced from Grade VI to VIII.
• To complete Grade 10, students will complete two Essential Courses from each of the eight curricular Areas available i.e., a total of 16 Essential Courses across two years of Grades 9 and 10
• Environmental education must for Grade X.
• The subjects to be divided into eight Curricular areas. The students to be given a choice to pick 16 courses from these 8 curricular areas. There would be no hard separation among arts, humanities, and sciences.
• Modular Board examinations will be offered as opposed to a single examination at the year end. The final certification will be based on the cumulative result of each of the examinations.