IITS PLACEMENTS

Public sector giants hogged the limelight at the ongoing placement season at IIT- Madras this year. As in the past, major recruiters were global investment banks, MNCs, leading Indian corporates and some private universities from West Asia and north India. Top PSUs that visited the campus this time include ONGC, DRDO, BHEL, NTPC, Mazagon Docks, Bharti Shipyard, Pipavav Shipyard, deputy registrar and placement offer Lt Col( retd) Jayakumar said, adding HAL too was slated to visit soon. Apart from core engineering companies, that took in as many as 70% of students, finance (7-10%), PSUs (10%) and FMCG (rest) sectors were the other big recruiters. The highest offer, though, came from Tower Research Capital at Rs 28 lakh pa. The company has taken in four students.The biggest offer last year was from oilfield services provider Schlumberger at Rs 22 lakh annually for Indian posting and Rs 44 lakh for overseas. Put together, PSUs took in aound 100 candidates — nearly 10% of the 1,077 students who had registered for plaecments — compared to 35 last year and offered annual packages ranging from Rs 5 to Rs 7.6 lakh. BHEL alone has offered 20 jobs, making it one of the biggest recruiters, next only to Delloitte which has hired 23. While the number of students placed so far, in absolute terms, is similar to that placed last year towards the end of January, average package has gone up 25% at around Rs 8 lakh pa. compared to Rs 6-7 lakh pa. during the 2008-09 session.Some of the first-timers on campus this year were World Quant, Boston Consultancy Group and Dolat Capital. Others on Day 1 included Morgan Stanley, McKinsey, IBM, Tower Research and Goldman Sachs. The Indian Navy too visited the IIT placement session, making five job offers for naval officers in specialised ship-building role. Top private companies that visited this time were L&T, Reliance, Ashok Leyland, Caterpillar, Daimler India, Tata Motors, TVS Motor, Mahindra & Mahindra, Hero Honda and GE. Nissan Motor is also scheduled to visit later this year coinciding with its inauguration of its plant near Chennai. Some students also took up teaching slots at varsities, both Indian and foreign. These include King Abdulaziz University (Saudi Arabia), Mewar University ( Rajasthan) and Lovely Professional University (Ludhiana). IIT Madras (IIT-M ) has marked two days exclusively in its placement calendar for ventures promoted by IIT alumni. Nearly 45 percent students from IIT-Kanpur have been picked up by various public and private sector companies of global repute during the
ongoing campus placement. Like other institutions, IIT-Kanpur too felt the pinch of global recession last year and thus, there was a sharp decline in the placements despite the best efforts made by concerned authorities. Around 120 companies have visited the IIT Bombay campus till date, with 500 offers in their bag. All told, over 180 companies have confirmed their presence.Around eight leading management consultants have visited the campus for recruitment including McKinsey, The Boston Consulting Group, Bain & Co, Booz & Company and The Monitor Group. Alvarez & Marsa has recruited for the first time from IIT Bombay. Other companies which have recruited from the campus include Sony, IBM, Intel, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Procter & Gamble, Tower Research Capital, Morgan Stanley, J P Morgan, Credit Suisse and Nomura. As many as 60 offers have been made by the financial services sector.At IIT Kharagpur, of the 1,341 students, around 531 have been placed. The highest offer at the institute has been for Rs 22 lakh per annum from Barclays Bank for a placement at Singapore. IIT Roorkee has invited around 1,200 companies to the campus against 800 last year. The institute will place around 1,200 students this year. So far, IBM has made an offer of Rs 14 lakh, which is the highest till date at IIT Roorkee. And at IIT Kanpur, Tower Research Capital, a financial services company from New York, has made the highest offer of Rs 44.5 lakh. These institutes said they have seen a 30 per cent salary hike over last year.A total of 3,031 students from seven IITs were recruited by MNCs through campus selection in 2008, according to figures sourced from the Ministry of Human Resources (MHRD). However, in 2009, the number had almost halved to stand at 1,606 since the effects of the global slowdown had kicked in. For instance, while in 2008, 593 students were selected from IIT- Bombay, this year only 381 students of the institute were selected by MNCs. And while 633 students from IIT-Delhi were recruited by MNCs last year, the number fell to 390 this year.However, this year, the response from companies has been so good that IIT-Kanpur invited around 200 ex-students on the campus to participate in its placement process this year. These students who passed out last year from the campus could not get placed owing to economic slowdown and thereby less participation by companies on the campus.The premier Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) have managed to place between 50 and 70 per cent of students till date. During the same period last year, these institutes had managed to place only around 35 per cent of their students due to the global economic slowdown. IITs began the final placements on December 1, 2009. The process will continue till March 2010.