Result achieved
Outcome summary
The Ministry of Labour and Employment of India (MOLE) improved data collection and verification of existing statistical data on social protection in accordance with SDG 1.3 methodology.
Outcome achieved
The Ministry of Labour and Employment of India (MOLE) improved data collection and verification of existing statistical data on social protection in accordance with SDG 1.3 methodology. The improvement of social protection statistics in India contributes to improving the global social protection database particularly to the effective coverage extended to children below 15. This resulted in increasing the extension of social protection for least one social protection branch from 24.4 per cent in the World Social Protection Report 2020–22 to 48.8 per cent in the 2024–26 edition —reflecting significant progress in extending social protection. Throughout this exercise, the governance of social protection statistics by the MOLE has been substantially strengthened which resulted in the increase of social protection data handling capacity of the Ministry of Labour and Employment (MOLE).
Focusing on the period of 2024-25, MOLE initiated social protection data pooling exercise both at the central and state levels in 2025 by following the data pooling methodology acquired through ILO’s technical assistance. In comparison with the social protection data collected in 2022 for the World Social Protection Report 2024-26, an aggregated coverage rate of at least one social protection branch increased to 64.3 per cent, which is an increase of 15.5 percentage points from 48.8 per cent in 2022. This figure comprises 57.9 per cent from central-level schemes only and 6.4 per cent from state-level schemes only (data collected in eight states. In actual numbers, the covered person increased from 692,096,923 in 2022 to 847,985,506 in 2025 with the actual increase of extending social protection to 155,888,583 (approx. 156 million).
ILO's contribution to the outcome
With the support of the Government of Japan, in collaboration with the Ministry of Labour and Employment (MOLE), the ILO provided a comprehensive methodological guidance of social protection data pooling exercise. ILO’s technical assistance includes the selection of relevant social security schemes in accordance with SDG 1.3 methodology at the central level and its social protection data verification system.
Gender equality & non-discrimination
The data pooling exercise by the MOLE, in ten selected states in India- Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, and Gujarat), has resulted in capturing beneficiary data from these states, including women beneficiaries of Central sector schemes and women-centric schemes in selected states.