Over the next 2-3 years, India’s technology sector will require more than 1 million engineers. Engineers with advanced skills like artificial intelligence and others. According to an industry association, demand will not be reached unless the country’s education and training systems are dramatically improved.
According to Sangeeta Gupta, senior vice president as well as chief strategy officer at the National Association of Software and Service companies in Bengaluru, more than half of the sector’s current workforce will need to be reskilled. It will be needed to work in fields such as AI, big data analytics, and cyber security.
New graduates will be able to fill one-quarter of the examinations.
According to her, new college graduates will only be able to fill one-quarter of the advanced technology positions that are required. In an interview on Monday, Gupta stated that ensuring worker employability is a significant task requiring significant efforts. “The industry can’t do with a one-time up-skilling; it has to be an ongoing process amid a fast-changing digital landscape.”
India’s $254 billion technology sector contributes significantly to the economy, employing over 5.4 million people. Technology services account for around 7.5% of the country’s $3 trillion-plus GDP.
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TCS announced last month that it is struggling to fill 80,000 vacancies due to a skills gap. It also increased the number of people trained in AI during the fiscal year that ended in March. Larsen & Toubro Ltd., India’s largest engineering and construction corporation, announced in June that its IT and IT-enabled services units were short of 20,000 engineers.
According to Gupta, the country’s substandard education system is the main culprit behind India’s skill gap. The gap spans from elementary to high school. Colleges do not educate students with adequate practical skills, which are required in the labor market, she claims. Nasscom stated that the demand-supply gap for digital talent is predicted to grow from 25% to around 29% by 2028.
The views echo warnings from well-known economists, such as former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan. He believed that India’s poor education would stymie the economic potential of the country. A country where more than half of the 1.4 billion people are under the age of 30.
