NO JOBS FOR NEW IITIANS

THE ECONOMIC SLOWDOWN IS BEGINNING TO TAKE A TOLL ON PLACEMENTS IN PRESTIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS LIKE THE IITS, WHERE THE TOP DEGREE IS NO LONGER A GUARANTEE OF AN ASSURED JOB OFFER

- SONAL KHETARPAL

ON December 9, 2023, Manish Kumar (name changed), a BTech in Electrical Engineering from IIT Delhi, was ecstatic—he had received a Rs 14 lakh per annum offer from a Singapore-based company. It took just five months, however, for his dream to unravel, as the firm rescinded the offer in June with a cursory message—“we are reducing the number of offers to only two from six”—and suggesting that he get back in touch with the institute’s placement team.

Much the same nightmare played out for another engineering student from IIT Guwahati, who does not wish to be named. He got a pre-placement offer from the ad tech firm Media.net in December 2023, only to be informed this June that the company has extended his joining date to January 2025 due to “unforeseen circumstances requiring an adjustment of our initial plan”, saying, “We will continue to monitor the situation closely and keep you informed of any developments,” leaving the joining date open-ended.

A third engineering graduate, this time from IIT (BHU) Varanasi, fared better, in that he got to work as an analytics consultant at EXL. However, the job lasted only a year as he was laid off in June 2023. “I have been unemployed for the past 11 months,” he laments.

One has long assumed that a degree from IIT or IIM is a gateway to a secure future. Which is why the fact that companies are either not offering jobs to IITians or revoking them is something students and others are finding hard to reconcile with. “As an IITian, not getting a job is the worst thing I could have ever imagined,” laments the IIT (BHU) graduate. Kumar is equally distraught. “The company revoked my offer at the very last moment, leaving me choiceless,” he says. Unable to find another job, he finally wrote to Dheeraj Singh, an IIT Kanpur alumnus and founder of Global IIT Alumni Support Group, who is now negotiating with the company on Kumar’s behalf.