Athira Sethu
Kochi, 19 October 2024
A spate of hiring has started in the second quarter of this year with a growing number of IT companies in India now opening their recruitment gates a little wider for fresh graduates. It was a slow quarter when hiring had dropped, but it seems like things are taking a turn for the better. According to reports, fresh hiring in the IT sector is expected to rise 20-25% in the 2024-25 fiscal year. In Global capability centers (subsidiaries of companies based in another country) approximately 40 percent more new or fresh graduates will be hired this year than last year.
Why Are Companies Hiring More Freshers?
The fundamental cause of the hiring spurts is the demand for skillful skills. Companies are opting for fresh graduates who can work in domains such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data analytics. Since technology is expanding, these areas become more and more necessary, therefore, companies need new employees to help them develop in these dimensions.
As TeamLease Digital puts it, demand for data is on the rise. This is because AI and automation are on the rise too. For example, postings for data scientists have gained in number while 69% of them required machine learning competencies. Interest in natural language processing has also gone up, from 5% in 2024 to 19% in 2025.
What Do Industry Leaders Say?
According to Neeti Sharma of TeamLease Digital, the only way that companies can continue being ahead in the game with these newer technologies is by having adjustments in recruitment policies. That is through investment in the employee’s training, especially in AI and Cloud computing. And, of course, in such an industry, there always is a need for constant learning and adjustment.
Many of India’s larger IT companies, including Tata Consultancy Services or TCS and HCLTech, are changing the way they hire. TCS announced that they are doubling their higher-cadre trainee intake and positioning the company with focused recruitment for quality talent specially skilled in certain domains. HCLTech is focusing on specialization during campus recruitment- looking for fresh graduates with a data and AI background. This shift in emphasis means that freshers with such skills can expect higher starting salaries than freshers with more general skills.
What About Salaries?
With this change in emphasis on specialized skills comes a change in salaries for fresh graduates as well. Freshers joining roles related to data or product management can anticipate salaries much beyond the averages. For example, in some cases, they draw salaries twice or four times higher than the average starting remuneration.
Mid-management and senior IT roles have also seen an increase. Organizations seek project managers, data scientists, and cybersecurity professionals. Wages for these job roles rose between 7.89% to 10.2% compared to the year before. This second growth area is the requirement for senior managerial job roles increasing by 21% in data engineering and product management.
The Impact of Cloud Technologies
The increase in hiring is also driven by increased Cloud technologies. The higher utilization of the services of the Cloud increases the number of skilled people needed in the engineering and development of Cloud engineering. India’s need for over 2 million Cloud professionals will reach the end of the fiscal year 2025. This is a sizable strength that keeps inflowing hiring up.
Conclusion
Indian IT is once again reporting a major turnaround in terms of fresh hiring in areas requiring special skills, especially in AI, ML, and data analytics. Hiring, specifically through TCS, HCLTech, and so on, makes the job market promising for fresh graduates. This will not only be a reflection of the improving hiring practice but also a depiction of how major their contributions in shaping the IT workforce will be in the future. So for the fresh graduates, this is indeed an exciting period as the demand for their skills is rising, and they can expect better job opportunities and salaries from this point of view.
