Top five IT companies to hire 1.8 lakh persons in 12 months, says Infosys

Indian IT sector seems to have come back to its record-breaking hiring days, with a top industry player Infosys projecting up to 1.8 lakh employees being hired by the five largest companies alone this year.

"Growth is back and most companies are hiring in large numbers again. The top five companies are estimated to hire 1,60,000 to 1,80,000 new employees in the next 12 months," Infosys CEO Kris Gopalakrishnan said here.

Such large-scale hiring activities were last witnessed in 2007 by Indian IT companies, after which they had to cut back on hiring and even prune their existing headcount to cope up with the economic slowdown.

"In 2008, the industry saw growth coming down to single digit. Most IT companies stopped hiring employees and stopped expanding," Mr. Gopalakrishnan said at a discussion on 'sustainable Development Strategies' organised by College of Architecture here last evening.

Mr. Gopalakrishnan said that the growth was now back in the sector and the companies were expanding their headcount.

He further said, "The IT industry has grown fast over the last 15 years. For example, the industry had about 1.50 lakh employees in 1993, around five lakh employees in 1999 and today, the industry employs around 2 million employees."

The highest-ever hiring in the IT space was seen in 2007, when more than four lakh jobs were created in Indian IT space by all the companies together.

TCS to hire 37,000 from campuses next fiscal

Mumbai: IT major Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), today said it plans to hire 37,000 professionals for its domestic and overseas markets through campus placements in the next fiscal.

"We plan to hire 37,000 professionals through campus recruitments in FY 12. We have so far visited 171 institutions pan-India," TCS Head (Global Human Resources), Ajoyendra Mukherjee, told reporters here.

"Our hiring ratio will be around 54:46 trainee and lateral respectively," he said.  The company had hired 27,500 professionals through campus recruitment last year.

"The demand is strong and we hope it will continue to grow in the coming days," he said.

The country's largest software exporter said it has hired 50,000 personnel in the nine-month period ended December 2010 and expects to add another 12,000-15,000 in Q4.

TCS added 20,219 people (gross) during the quarter (Q3 FY 11), its highest addition yet, taking its total headcount to 1,86,914 at the end of the December quarter.

"Given the strength of business demand, we have exceeded the hiring target of 50,000 employees we had set for this fiscal year," Mukherjee said.

TCS CEO and Managing Director, N Chandrasekaran , had yesterday said the company faces the major challenge of attrition.

"Our short-term challenge is we have to continue to retain people although the attrition rate has come down in Q3 FY 11," Chandrasekaran had said.

Big Fraud in US Around 1599 Students are cheated by the TRI VALLEY UNIVERSITY

Washington, 25 January 2011: Hundreds of Indian students, mostly from Andhra Pradesh, face the prospect of deportation from the US after authorities raided and shut down a university in the Silicon Valley on charges of a massive immigration fraud.

The Tri-Valley University in Pleasanton, a major suburb in San Francisco Bay Area, has been charged by federal investigating authorities with being part of an effort to defraud, misuse visa permits and indulge in money laundering and other crimes.

According to a federal complaint filed in a California court, the University, which was raided and shut down last week, helped foreign nationals illegally acquire immigration status. The university is said to have 1,555 students. As many as 95 per cent of these students are Indian nationals, the complaint said.

Investigations by Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) found that while students were admitted to various residential and online courses of the university and on paper lived in California, in reality they "illegally" worked in various parts of the country as far as Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Texas.

ICE has called it as a "sham university." The ICE investigations found that more than half of these students were reported to be residing in a single apartment located in Sunnyvale California.

During the course of the investigation ICE found that the university gave the residential address of its students in order to conceal that they did not live in California, said the court papers. For a student to maintain an active immigration status, they must show proof that they are making reasonable process towards completing coursework and physically attend classes.

Federal investigating authorities are now sweeping out on each of those students, who paid lakhs for obtaining students visa and also students work permit. Several of them have been interrogated, creating a panic reaction among the Indian student community.

Many of the students from Andhra Pradesh, who were planning to join the university for the new semester, have cancelled their US travel plans. Classes were scheduled to start on January 10 after the winter break.

It is understood that many of these students are planning to leave the country as soon as possible as they are being interrogated.

There are unconfirmed reports of some of the students being detained and deportation process has been started against them. Once the university has been shut down, the students who come on F-1 visa, lose their status within a stipulated time. These students have been making desperate calls to Indian- American immigration attorneys.

"We have received verification that ICE has detained some of the students and placed them in removal proceedings," Murthy Law Firm, a popular immigration attorney firm among Indian-Americans, said in a posting on its website.

On January 20, 2011 the Murthy Law Firm received numerous phone calls from students registered at Tri-Valley University in Pleasanton, California, it said in its posting.

"Some of the F-1 Tri-Valley students may have options to try to change status in the United States. Some are potentially eligible to request a change to H-4 or other dependant statuses.

"Others might be eligible for H1B status through employers, but may not have enough time to file for the soon-to-be reached FY 2011 H1B cap. Those who have previously held H1B status and do not need cap numbers would not face this problem," advised the Murthy Law Firm.

Tri-Valley University, on its website, says that it is a Christian Higher Education Institution aiming to offer rigorous and excellent quality academic programmes in the context of Christian faith and world view. It offers a wide range of courses. According to the complaint, the university and its founder Susan Su have made millions of dollars in tuition fee for issuing visa-related documents that enabled hundreds of foreign nationals to obtain illegal student immigration status.

Calls were made to various telephone numbers listed on the Tri Valley website but either the voice mail box was full or the number was not accepting any new calls.

According to the court document, ICE began its investigations in May 2010. In February 2009, the university received necessary permission to issue visas for 30 students and in May that year it had some 11 active students who had F-1 visas. The number jumped to 939 by May 2010.

Wish You a Happy Pongal to All

IPL-4 Auction: Teams and list of players

Bengaluru: Following is the list of players, the franchisee and the amount auctioned for IPL-4.

Deccan Chargers
Dale Steyn $1.2 million (200,000)
Kevin Pietersen: $650,000 (400,000)
Cameron White: $1.1 million (300,000)
Kumar Sangakkara: $700,000 (300,000)
JP Duminy: $300,000 (200,000)
Shikhar Dhawan: $300,000 (100,000)
Ishant Sharma $450,000 (200,000)
Pragyan Ojha $500,000 (200,000)
Amit Mishra $300,000 (100,000)

Money spent: $5.5 million
Money available: $3.5 million

* * *

Kolkata Knight Riders
Gautam Gambhir: $2.4 million (200,000)
Yusuf Pathan: $2.1 million (300,000)
Jacques Kallis: $1.1 million (300,000)
Brad Haddin $325,000 (200,000)
Shakib Al Hasan: $425,000 (200,000)
Brett Lee $400,000 (400,000)
Eoin Morgan $350,000 (200,000)
Manoj Tiwary 475,000 (100,000)

Money spent: $7.58 million
Money available: $1.42 million

* * *

RCB

Tillakaratne Dilshan $650,000 (400,000)
Zaheer Khan: $900,000 (300,000)
AB de Villiers: $1.1 million (400,000)
Daniel Vettori: $550,000 (400,000)
Saurabh Tiwary: $1.6 million (100,000)
Dirk Nannes $650,000 (200,000)
Cheteshwar Pujara $700,000 (100,000)

Money spent: $7.95 million
Money available: $1.05 million

* * *
Mumbai Indians

Rohit Sharma: $2 million (200,000)
Andrew Symonds: $850,000 (300,000)
David Jacobs: $190,000 (20,000)
James Franklin: 100,000, (100,000)

Money spent: $7.64 million
Money available: $1.36 million

* * *
Pune Warriors
Yuvraj Singh: $1.8 million (400,000)
Graeme Smith: $500,000 (400,000)
Robin Uthappa: $2.1 million (200,000)
Angelo Matthews: $950,000 (300,000)
Tim Paine: $270,000 (100,000)
Ashish Nehra $850,000 (200,000)
Nathan McCullum 100,000 (100,000)
Callum Ferguson $300,000 (100,000

Money spent: $6.87 million
Money available: 2.13 million

* * *
Team Kochi
M Jayawardene: $1.5 million (400,000)
VVS Laxman: $400,000 (300,000)
Brendon McCullum: $475,000 (400,000)
S. Sreesanth: $900,000 (200,000)
RP Singh: $500,000 (200,000)
Parthiv Patel: $290,000 (100,000)
Ravindra Jadeja: $950,000 (100,000)
Steven Smith: $200,000 (200,000)
Muttiah Muralitharan $1.1 million (300,000)
Ramesh Powar $180,000 (100,000)
Brad Hodge $425,000 (200,000)
Money spent: $6.92 million
Money available: $2.08 million

Delhi Daredevils
Irfan Pathan: $1.9 million (300,000)
David Warner: $750,000 (200,000)
Naman Ojha: $270,000 (100,000)
James Hopes: $350,000 (200,000)
Morne Morkel $475,000 (100,000)
Aaron Finch $300,000 (100,000)
Money spent: $5.48 million
Money available: $3.15 million

* * *
Chennai Super Kings

Michael Hussey: $425,000 (200,000)
Wriddhiman Saha $100,000 (100,000)
Dwayne Bravo: $200,000 (200,000)
Doug Bollinger $700,000 (200,000)
R. Ashwin $850,000 (100,000)
S. Badrinath $800,000 (100,000)
Money spent: $7.58 million
Money available: $1.42 million

Rajasthan Royals
Ross Taylor: $1 million (400,000)
Rahul Dravid: $500,000 (400,000)
Johan Botha: $950,000 (200,000)
Paul Collingwood $250,000 (200,000)
Money spent: $5.8 million
Money available: $1.2 million

Kings XI Punjab
Adam Gilchrist: $900,000 (400,000)
David Hussey: $1.4 million (300,000)
Dinesh Karthik $900,000 (200,000)
Shaun Marsh: $400,000 (400,000)
Stuart Broad: $400,000 (400,000)
Abhishek Nayar: $800,000 (50,000)
Praveen Kumar $800,000 (200,000)
Ryan Harris $325,000 (200,000)
Piyush Chawla: $900,000 (100,000)
Money spent: $6.83 million
Money available: $2.17 million

 

Gambhir is top scorer with $2.4 mn in IPL 4 Auction

Gambhir bagged $2.4 million from Kolkata Knight Riders, which in turn proved to be the highest bid for the day besides being the most expensive in the brief history of the league, tripping past the previous highs of Andrew Flintoff and Kevin Pietersen (both at $1.55 million) in 2009 and M.S. Dhoni ($1.5 million) in 2008.

Team India proved why it is in number 1 position in test Rankings

Cape Town test ends in a draw, England win the Ashes, Anil Kumble quits IPL and lots more. Take a look.

Match Drawn, Series Even

The third and final Test match between India and South Africa ended in a draw. Chasing 340 for a win, Gautam Gambhir top-scored with 64 as India decided to play for a draw. Jacques Kallis was declared the Man-of-the-Match and the Man-of-the-Series. India have enough reason to cheer as this is the first time they have drawn a Test series in South Africa.

Set a daunting target of 340 for a win, India opted to play safe and bat their way to a draw in the third and final cricket Test against South Africa to end the high-profile series 1-1 here. The Indians never made an effort to chase down the stiff target and the batsmen played out time to crawl to 166 for three in their second innings before play was called off to mark the end of a fascinating three-match series.

Although the Indians could not achieve their dream of a maiden away series win over South Africa, it was a creditable achievement for the visitors as they drew a Test series for the first time on the African soil. The result also meant that India maintained their number one ranking. The visitors lost the first Test in Centurion by an innings and 25 runs but showed great character to bounce back and win the second Test in Durban by 87 runs.

The Indians could have entertained hopes of going for the target had Virender Sehwag (11) fired but the dashing opener fell cheaply to end the series without too may runs to his credit. Gautam Gambhir defied an elbow injury and played a resolute knock of 64 to be the highest scorer in the second innings. Sachin Tendulkar (14) and VVS Laxman (32) were at the crease when play was called off after 82 overs.