New Delhi: The number of males in paid employment has gone up by more than 4 percentage points while the number of females in such employment activities has increased by over 3 percentage points, according to the all-India Time Use Survey released by the National Statistics Office (NSO) on Tuesday.
“In 2024 as many as 75 per cent of the males and 25 per cent of the females in the age group 15-59 years, participated in employment and related activities during the reference period of 24 hours which is an increase from the corresponding figure of 70.9 per cent for males and 21.8 per cent for females in such participation during 2019,” the survey states.
Female participants aged 15-59 years in unpaid domestic services spent about 315 minutes during 2019 in those activities, which has come down to 305 minutes during 2024 signifying the shift from unpaid to paid activities, the survey states.
As many as 41 per cent of females aged 15-59 years participated in caregiving for their household members, male participation in this age group in such caregiving was 21.4 per cent.
Also, female participants in caregiving activities spent about 140 minutes in a day, compared to 74 minutes spent by male participants aged 15-59 years. This corroborates the Indian social fabric wherein most of the caregiving responsibilities for household members are borne by the females of the household, according to the survey.
It points out that 24.6 per cent of the rural population aged 15-59 years participated in producing goods for own final use and they spent 121 minutes a day doing such activities.
The survey highlights that 89.3 per cent of children aged 6-14 years participated in learning activities and they spent around 413 minutes in a day for such activities.
People aged 6 years and above spent 11 per cent of their days’ time in culture, leisure, mass media and sports practices during 2024, compared to 9.9 per cent of the days’ time spent during 2019.
In TUS, 2024, respondents were asked about their activities performed in the designated time slots of 30 minutes and the same was recorded against the corresponding slot.
In case of multiple activities in a time slot, a maximum of three activities which were performed for 10 minutes or more, were recorded. Information on time use was collected for persons aged 6 years and above with a reference period of 24 hours.
The survey covered 1,39,487 households (rural: 83,247 and urban: 56,240). Information on time use was collected from each member of age 6 years and above of the selected households.
The National Statistics Office (NSO) conducted the first all-India Time Use Survey during January – December 2019. The present TUS conducted during January December 2024 is the second such All-India Survey.
India is among the few countries, including Australia, Japan, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand, USA and China that conduct the National Time Use Survey to analyse how people allocate their time to various daily activities.
The primary objective of the survey is to measure the participation of men and women in paid and unpaid activities.
TUS is an important source of information on the time spent in unpaid caregiving activities, volunteer work, and unpaid domestic service-producing activities of the household members. It also provides information on time spent on learning, socialising, leisure activities, self-care activities, etc., by the household members.
(IANS)
