Given the robust performance of India’s rural organised manufacturing industries in recent times, this study attempts to understand the nature of the technical change underlying it. Felipe and Kumar’s (2010) analytical framework is used to assess the direction of technical change in India’s rural industries in the period 1998–99 to 2016–17. The findings indicate that the direction of technical change was Hicks-neutral from 1998–99 to 2007–08 and Marx-biased from 2008–09 to 2016–17. At the disaggregated level, various industries exhibited diverse directions of technical change. The high growth seen in the economy in the first decade of this century was accompanied by a sustained rise in capital productivity. This ended subsequently, which contributed to a slowing down of the growth rate.
