58 million jobs to be created till 2012 

The government seems confident that it would be able to create 58 million additional jobs by the end of the 11th Five Year Plan in 2012. The reason behind this is the recovery in the farm sector and this has had a positive impact on the rural economy. All this was told by the Labour Minister recently.

Since agriculture has shown quite a positive trend, the economy is expected to grow at nine percent in this fiscal year. The unemployment would be staying in control.
The minster said, "The real position will be known after data on employment and unemployment is released by the National Sample Survey Organisation."

Two thirds of the labour is directly or indirectly engaged in agriculture and the growth in this sector would definitely prove beneficial.

The gross domestic product (GDP) has climbed upto 8.9 percent each in the first two quarters.

The 10th Five Year Plan could not meet its target of creating 50 million additional jobs because manufacturing, tourism and agriculture sectors could not generate much employment

The labour ministry has put together a working draft of a new employment policy. Skilled manpower would be created which would be demanded by both public and private sectors. "The focus of the policy will be on employment generation and productivity with flexible framework of training," said the Labour Minister, Mr.Rawat.

Employment exchanges would now be modernized. It would be done with public-private partnership model. Accurate data on vacancies, skill set requirements etc would all be available online. Currently 37 million people are registered with employment exchanges.
Exchanges would also be providing counselling and would serve as a platform for employers to post their vacancies and gather information on available skill sets.

Source: The Economic Times

Indian companies out for hiring top talent 
 
The young companies, across the country are trying to hire top talent and this competition among them is growing more intense. All this is due to setting up of new businesses by the entrepreneurs. They are in competition with the large business houses and corporations.


The demand from startups has increased to 350-400 this year from 100 people last year. This was told by the head of HR department of a firm that specializes in startup services.  


There is a manifold increase in hiring by startups. The average employee headcount has risen to a median of 20 from one in the current year. 

According to an employability assessment firm based in Gurgaon, less than a fifth of engineering graduates were ready to work in small companies, with only 7.2% actively seeking such a position.
 
The reasons which make the talented professional stay away from the startup companies are their untested businesses, simple offices, minimal support, modest pay packages and no brand names. To solve all these problems the HR firms are trying to attract the professionals through the social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
The pinch of having almost zero brand names is felt by the startups. There is greater shortage of talented professionals more in technology firms where core team of developers is required for product development.

Another challenge faced by them is retention. They find it difficult to retain the talent for a longer period of time in the wake of huge demand and supply gap.
 
Employees also prefer to work in startups that are backed by significant risk capital investment by a prominent investor.
 
In order to lure the talent some internet startups are also ready to pay higher to retain talent.
 
All this can affect innovation in the startup ecosystem.
 
Source: Economic Times

Common entrance test for banks 

From the next year onwards there will now be a common entrance test on all India bases for those aspiring to join public sector banks. The objective behind this decision is that it would reduce recruitment time and all the hassles and complexities attached to the recruitment process. This would be beneficial both for the candidates as well as for the banks. 

The recruitment process will now take quite a less time. So the candidates won’t have to face mental tension during the waiting time after the exam. All this was told by Indian Banks Association's Chief Executive, K Ramakrishnan, to PTI. He said that there would now be a common pan-India entrance test.

The complete process at present takes almost one year right from advertisement to examination and interview stage till the stage of final recruitment.
It is planned to conduct three-four such common entrance examinations. This would be done every year beginning with 2011.

The exam will be conducted by The Institute of Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS) and will also declare the results of the exam and give a scorecard to the candidates. The scores would be valid for up to one to one-and-a-half-years.
 

These exams will be held for clerical staff and entry-point officers.

Source: The Times of India

Govt planning to have a common central exam for school teachers

It is being thought by the government to replacing the state-level exams for recruiting school teachers. It will be substituted with a common centralized examination. All this is aimed to improve the quality of teaching in the country’s government schools. This was told by the officials of human resource development ministry.

Talks among the human resource ministry and the states and the National Council for Teacher Education will soon take place regarding this matter.

Candidates will have to appear for the proposed examination. After completing Bachelor of Education or Diploma in Education qualification the candidates can appear for this proposed examination.

This has been proposed by some state governments. A centralized system would be carried out by the state government. This would be done in order to handle the logistics effectively. Format, question bank and parameters would also be given to the state governments. 

India needs one million teachers at present. Then only can the Right to Education Act would be implemented effectively. There are around 220 million students in schools all over the country.

Not only we need teachers in large numbers but we also need quality work. So the teachers would be selected from the universe of those who cleared this entrance exam. The new proposal would be notified in a few months.  

Other areas which need attention apart from recruiting the teachers are to reduce absenteeism among teachers and improving the level of learning among the students. 

Source: Livemint

$2 billion for education, pledged by Premji

Wipro chairman Azim Premji has pledged to give about Rs 8,846 crore ($2 billion) to improve school education in India. 213 million shares would be transferred to a trust.. The transfer would be completed by December 7. This statement was given by Wipro to Bombay Stock Exchange 

This philanthropic act is expected to fund the educational activities of the Azim Premji Foundation which is dedicated to work in the area of education in rural India. Premji is India's third richest man with a net worth of $18 billion. 

A $2-billion endowment even at a conservative return of 8%- 12% is expected to generate annually returns of $160-250 million (Rs 750-1,150 crore). This will be used to run APF initiatives, including the Bangalore-based Azim Premji University. 

The university, offering post-graduate courses in education and development, will start with 200 students in 2011 and scale to 2,000 in 4-5 year. 

In a statement issued by Wipro, it was said that good education was the foremost need and requisite for building a just, equitable, humane and a sustainable society. 

Whether it is school level of education or university level, major focus would be on the underprivileged sections of the society.

AIEEE to online from next year 

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has announced that the All India Engineering Entrance Examination (AIEEE) will go online from next year just like CAT, which has also been made online since 2009.

It is an entrance test which is conducted by the CBSE for admission to Bachelor of Engineering (BE) and Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech) at various Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), National Institutes of Technology (NITs). The test scores are also used for admission by other state-level engineering institutions.

An expert agency will conduct the online format of AIEEE from next year. The board is still indecisive about the entrance exam for Bachelor of Architecture (B.Arch.) i.e. whether it would be conducted online or not.

It has been decided by CBSE that it would involve an outside agency for this test at national level. This will ensure its smooth working. It would be similar to the conduction of CAT which is conducted by Prometric.

Well experienced and quality oriented agencies are being invited by the board for designing and constructing large scale professional examinations on Computer-Based Testing (CBT) mode for AIEEE, 2011.

It has also been decided to merge the All India Pre-Medical Test (AIPMT) with the AIEEE from 2011. CBSE conducts AIPMT every year in order to fill up 15% of the seats in MBBS and BDS courses in various government medical as well as dental colleges against all India quota.

A combined merit list is drawn by AIEEE for different categories of engineering colleges. The online format of the AIPMT to be conducted from the next is yet to be clarified by CBSE. 

 

PG seats to be increased: MCI 

The chairperson of MCI, recently at a convocation ceremony, said that MCI wants to increase the PG seats in the medical colleges all over the country. MCI also expects to bring about absolute transparency in the system in the coming times.

The objective behind all this is to bring about greater opportunities for the students so that they are able to define their career paths more precisely. Our country needs doctors and post graduates in large numbers along with other health care professionals.

Comparing with U.S the chairperson of MCI said, “The number of seats for post graduates in the US are 24000 while for under graduates it is 16000. In India however we have 35000 seats for under graduates and 11000 seats for post graduates. We hope to change this equation."

The post graduate seats are likely to be increased to 19000. More colleges would be made to offer a post graduate degree courses. All this can provide greater opportunities for students even in rural areas. Meticulous planning, proper strategies and vision are important for the students to succeed.

With the removal of the essentiality clause now there are five times more applicants for the PG degree courses. This without compromising on quality and competence the country would be able to get better and well qualified medical professionals.  
 

Source: Times of India

CMU to provide engineering education in India

It was announced by Carnegie Mellon University and a foundation in India that a partnership would provide an undergraduate engineering course to students in India and in Pittsburgh to get a degree from CMU.

The announcement as a legislation has come up in the Indian parliament that leading US universities could now establish their campuses here in India.

With the growing of Indian economy in, now many foreign universities are thinking about strengthening their ties with us and have already expresses their interests to expand their functions here.

A graduate program in embedded systems would b provided to the students under this partnership. The courses in mechanical engineering and electrical and computer engineering would start from June. The curriculum is created at CMU and it would be taught at India’s SSN campus in Chennai. Its faculty has been trained at CMU.

Initially there would be small classes with 10-15 students. The number of students are expected to increase to 100 within 5 years.

CMU officials said nothing about the opening of their campus here.

CMU President Jared L. Cohon said, “This will establish a new way of delivering engineering education”. He said that India’s engineers have key role in the research and scientific institutions all over the world.

Officials believe that this partnership would prove to be very beneficial and transformational to the Indian students as CMU ranks eighth in the world for engineering.

Source: Post-Gazette