PSUs lock horns with private firms at IIT placements

India’s state-run companies are going head-to-head with private tech to consulting giants to snap up talent from the nation’s top engineering colleges this year, reflecting the desire among government-owned firms to strengthen and diversify employee pool.

The public-sector units (PSUs), which usually visited campuses in the second half of the placement period, are recruiting from Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and National Institutes of Technology (NITs) in the first few days of the season. Hiring for roles in research and development, digital and engineering teams, they are offering competitive salaries of ₹15-21 lakh a year, along with retention plans, career mobility options and the promise of a stable job, Mint has learnt.

National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency Ltd, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation and Aadhaar-issuing Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) are among the PSUs that have swooped on the campuses early. Others include Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd, Chennai Petroleum Corporation Ltd, Gas Authority of India Ltd, Centre for Development Telematics and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd.

Hiring volumes lagging

Hiring volumes of conventional tier 1 recruiters have not kept pace with the significant increase in the number of students graduating from IITs and NITs, creating an opportunity for new categories of recruiters to pick talent from these premier institutions, said Amitabh Jhingan, partner EY Parthenon and EY Global Education Sector Leader. Also, while overall PSU hiring has declined, their desire to “diversify and rejuvenate their human capital and talent base” has potentially increased recruitment from tier 1 campuses, he said.

Of the 23 IITs, first-generation institutes including Madras, Bombay, Delhi, Kharagpur, Roorkee and Kanpur start the placement season in December. The second- and third-generation IITs, along with the NITs, begin in August-September to get a headstart.

“We usually visit top ranked IITs and prefer to visit on Day 0 and Day 1 of placements,” Nishith Chaturvedi, chief human resource officer at NPCI said in an emailed response to Mint. “We also engage with candidates across different campus engagement programs to enable them to showcase their talent and skills prior to the campus hiring season.”

Mint‘s emailed queries to the other PSUs mentioned earlier and the IITs of Delhi, Bombay, Kanpur, Roorkee, Kharagpur, Madras, and Guwahati remained unanswered.

PSUs compete with high-frequency trading companies (HFTs), private banks, startups and consulting companies, and salaries offered in some cases crossed a couple of crores of rupees along with international postings. HFTs and consulting firms also offer long-term incentives and variable bonuses that are part of the overall compensation.

“It is interesting how PSUs, which earlier mostly visited IIT campuses for recruitment in the second phase when the best of the lot was already placed, are now trying to compete with top tier financial, software, analytics, consulting and IT firms,” said Kripa Shankar Singh, training and placement officer at IIT Patna.

Atractive proposition

According to placement teams at IITs, the perks offered by PSUs such as accommodation and travel, along with the job security, make them an attractive proposition to the students.

“The average salaries offered by these PSUs is on a par with private sector companies and additionally there is more job security here, so a lot of students are trying to get into the PSUs,” said a student from IIT Kharagpur from the batch of 2025.

While PSUs may not be able to displace the banking, consulting and IT firms as preferred employers, according to Jhingan, they have emerged as a potential employment option for students graduating from the IITs and other tier 1 Institutions looking to start their career journey.

Students are looking at a few years down the line than jump at the first good offer, according to the placement head of one of the older NITs. “Money matters but I see students find out where their roles will be few years later, what are the research opportunities that they will get, the upskilling chances, etc. Some of the PSUs are offering that.”

The IITs, too, are reaching out to the state-run companies. They expect companies like Gujarat Mineral Development Corporation (GMDC) and Gas Authority of India Ltd (GAIL) to recruit during the second phase, a placement coordinator from one of the top five older IITs told Mint.