TCS pink slip to techies with fudged CVs

"As a customer-focused organization, security is of paramount importance to us. We have a stringent background verification process in TCS. We take this process very seriously and have issued action against the errant employees. We have launched an internal investigation to identify the entire ecosystem and all involved in the racket," said a senior company official.

In the recent past all the major IT firms, including Infosys, Satyam and Wipro, and many mid-sized firms have taken a hard stand on fake or fudged resumes. However, the incidents continue. First Advantage, a leading background screening firm, in its recent report states that 30 per cent of all the resumes they have screened have discrepancies.

In 2006-07, the company screened over 2 million applicants across industries.

Ashish Dehade, managing director (West Asia), First Advantage says, "The percentage has been increasing. In 2006 it was 16-17 per cent, for 2007 its was 30 per cent and while we are just six months into 2008 the percentage is around 30 per cent."

TCS is not the only firm doing this. Earlier Infosys had asked close to 100 employees to leave in FY07 due to discrepancies found in the resumes.

Same goes for Satyam and Wipro Technologies. Some time back it was reported that Wipro would be sharing with other IT firms the database of job applicants who have faked information in their CVs.

Satyam has put in place a system that does a background check even before the candidate actually comes and joins the firm.

"Well most of the companies have put in place some procedure to tackle this. We started this process two years back and 100 per cent of our associates joining come through this system. This has dramatically brought down the number of resumes with discrepancies," says Sucharita Palepu, Satyam HR MyHR Frameworks head.

IT sector is the second most affected verticals, banking sector has the highest discrepancies, when it comes to fudged resumes. One in every four CVs received by the IT services firm has some kind of discrepancies. And one in every six CVs in the BPO industry in fudges states the First Advantage report.

The problem is not just at the fresher level, it goes up to the senior level as well. "One of the leading IT firms was hiring a practice head. But after his background check it came to light that the gentleman with over 20 years of industry experience had fake IIT certificates," says a spokesperson from a leading background screening firm in India.

To tackle this problem industry body Nasscom, created the National Skills Registry (NSR), which has a candidates personal, academic and employment details and undergoes professional verifications.

The registration numbers towards the end of 2007 was 160,000. However, despite the actions taken by IT firms Dehade feels that the problem will persist in India. "Education and employment discrepancies in BFSI, ITeS/BPO sectors have seen the highest increase in the past 15 months."