IT sector recruitments on the rise in Orissa

Orissa may not have made its mark as a major IT destination, but it has certainly emerged as a favourite talent hunting ground for IT firms.

A host of big names in IT field, such as Infosys, Wipro, Satyam, TCS and Kanbay together have picked up of 554 students from different engineering colleges in Bhubanewar alone through both on-campus and off-campus interviews during last couple of months.

This is at least 20 to 30 per cent higher than the recruitment witnessed by the city based technical colleges previously. The combined job offer by the IT firms during campus interviews in these colleges earlier ranged between 400 to 500 students in a year.

Some of the top recruiters this time included Infosys with 214 students, Satyam 154, Wipro 68, TCS 48, Kanbay 46, Tata Elxi 12 and Integral software 12. In December last Patni Software had picked up 30 students at a centralised campus test.

Earlier, it took a lot of cajoling by the engineering colleges to get the reputed firms to come for campus interview. Now the trend is just the opposite.

The fact that some big IT firms, for whom quality manpower is a key input for success, are making a beeline to the campuses here for recruitment confirms the high standards of education being imparted in these institutions, says a spokesperson of Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology (KIIT) which has 97 of its students placed in Infosys this year.

Apart from KIIT, Institution of Technical Education and Research, Orissa Engineering College, College of Engineering and Technology, National Institute of Science and Technology of Berhampur, IGIT, Saranga and University College of Engineering, Burla have reported good placed in IT firms this year.

The demand was so much that many of the recruits of this season are still in their sixth or seventh semesters who will pass out next year.

"IT companies these days are very particular about tapping the first lot of the batch and do not want to screen the left overs", said Raj Kumar Hota, vice-principal and placement in charge of Institute of Technical Education and Research (ITER) explaining the phenomenon.

Earlier the focus of recruitment drive of IT companies was big cities like Delhi, Pune, Mumbai, Bangalore and Chennai. What has now made them to look to a city like Bhubaneswar this time. Says Sanjeeve Nayak of Silicon Valley Institute, Students here were second to none in technical performance, but when it came to communication and aptitude tests they fared relatively poor. Now the fact that most engineering colleges here are giving a lot of focus on communication tools, the students are doing comparatively better".

Besides, Orissa with 36 engineering colleges having a combined seat strength of 10,000 seats has plenty of talents to offer, he added.