Indian IT industry has become very big in the past few years and the main reason for this is most IT companies present in country are working for clients living in other countries. Foreign clients tend to prefer India not only for the skill but also for the rates at which engineers in India are ready to work for.
The starting salary for engineering graduates in India hasn’t increased much in the last decade. Companies like Wipro, Infosys pay around Rs 20,000 per month to a fresher which is very low considering the quality of the work they demand. TCS is planning to improve the scenario by offering an almost double salary to freshers who are updated with latest technologies used in digital market. While TCS pays around Rs. 3.5 lakh per annum to fresh graduates, these graduates will make around Rs. 6.5 lakh a year if they pass a test.
Selection process
The employees will be selected through a new test that focuses on new-age digital skills. Another test named National Qualifier Test or NQT will be started and candidates with good scores in this test will get a chance to sit in the digital-focused test.
“People who have done well in the NQT will get a chance to write another test for the digital talent pool, and if they clear and go through the interview, then they will get into the digital pool and their compensation will be differentiated,” Ajoy Mukherjee, executive VP and head of global human resources said in a recent interview.
The digital test will be longer and will require better programming skills to solve higher degree of problems compared to the NQT.
TCS is also raising the salary packages of currently working employees in the company who have knowledge of artificial intelligence, data analysis, and machine learning.
Such moves can possibly break the cycle of low starting salaries at India’s IT firms. This move could have come into thought after seeing the country’s most talented freshers preferring startups or internationally known companies such as Google and Facebook.
Former Infosys CFO Mohandas Pai had once alleged that Indian IT companies are working together to keep the salaries low. “Indian IT is not paying its freshers well. And in fact, big companies are coming together talking to each other not to increase their salary,” he had said last year.
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