2 ...but rural wage data shows Gujarat is largely in sync with the all-india trend

Unlike agricultural growth rate, rural wage data is available for Gujarat until September 2022. An examination of the trend in real rural wages shows that Gujarat is not very different from the rest of India. Real rural wages have been contracting for the past few months at both the all-india level and in the state. This suggests that the rural economy, or at least the blue-collared labour market, is in doldrums. It also perhaps explains the Union government’s decision to extend the Pradhan

Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojna (PMGKY), which offers an additional 5kg of foodgrain to all public distribution system (PDS) beneficiaries, until the month of December, despite considerable fiscal strain. That means we may have to look deeper for the absence of rural anger.