White-collar hiring in India lowered by 11% in January 2024 when compared to January 2023, according to the latest Naukri JobSpeak Index.

The Index stood at 2,455 for January 2024, up 1% compared to December 2023.

Medical/healthcare/hospital (7%), travel & hospitality (5%) and FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) (5%) are the major sectors that witnessed year-on-year job growth in January 2024 in an otherwise cautious market.

On the other hand, telecom/ISP saw the steepest decline of 22%. IT-software/software services also saw a decline of 19% over the year.

By experience level, senior professionals with more than 16 years of experience witnessed maximum positive momentum in job offers (18%). New job offers for professionals falling in experience category of 13-16 years went up by almost 2%.

Meanwhile, for professionals falling in the experience categories of 8-12 years, 4-7 years and for freshers, the new jobs created were lower by 18%, 7% and 10%, respectively, compared to January 2023.

Across cities, the emerging city of Kochi saw the steepest decline at 25% while Ahmedabad saw flat growth over the year. The metro city of Bangalore saw a fall of 19%. 

The Naukri JobSpeak is a monthly Index representing the state of the Indian job market & hiring activity based on new job listings and job-related searches by recruiters on the resume database of Naukri.com.