IT minister: The sector will create 20-25 lakh jobs in 4-5 years

Ravi Shankar Prasad also said, “I completely deny and refute that there is any downturn in the employment in the IT sector.”

Concerns related to the slow pace of growth in new jobs have been rising in India, with the latest figures showing only a 1.1 per cent in addition of jobs while the economy is seen growing at around 7 per cent. In addition, the firing of many professionals from the IT sector, have compounded such fears as the industry is the preferred destination of thousands of graduates passing out of engineering and management colleges.

But according to the Electronics and Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, such concerns are without a base as according to him almost 20 to 25 lakh additional jobs will be created in the sector in the coming four to five years.

India's IT and software industry is already suffering due to various reasons such as HI-B Visa issue along with the recent lay-off of employees, which have worsened the already tough situation that employees from the sector are facing, with the visa restrictions having already hit the country's 150 million dollar outsourcing industry.

Such conditions witnessed the formation of the country's first union of software professionals which is to set up in the state of Tamil Nadu in the background of the recent demonstration by IT professionals following the sacking of employees by tech services giant Cognizant.

The minister though remains adamant that such issues are of no serious concern, as during an interaction with reporters he said, "I completely deny and refute that there is any downturn in the employment in the IT sector. It is robust. Once the digital economy is here, you will see how much it will progress."

He added, "Indian IT companies are spread across 200 cities and 80 countries around the world, which provide direct employment to 40 lakh people and indirect employment to almost 1.3 crore people. As the industry is moving forward, it is Nasscom's assessment that in the coming four to five years, almost 20-25 lakh additional jobs will be created."

The Minister also reportedly said that India's digital economy will be of an estimated $1 trillion in value, in the next five to seven years.

"In the last three years, almost six lakh people have been employed in our IT sector. In 2016-17, the number of people employed was around 1.7 lakh," the minister reportedly said. "We have common service centres in about 2.5 lakh cities and almost 10 lakh people are employed there," he added.

According to the statement by his ministry, the Indian companies from the sector are currently serving two-thirds of the Fortune 500 companies and have created 40 lakh direct jobs in India.

On the projections of made by Nasscom, a software industry organisation, on the employment potential of the industry, the release said, "Nasscom has confirmed that the industry continues to be a net hirer and reports that 2.5-3 million new jobs will be created by 2025. In 2016-17, the industry added 170,000 new jobs."

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