Furnishing the Numbers

Students

who pass out of engineering colleges and other universities with a qualification

in computers often take up fast track or short courses at private IT training

institutes to acquire skills in latest technologies. Students from the fields of

fashion designing, commercial arts, film institutes and architecture join

multimedia courses to learn the use of multimedia in their respective

professions.

As per our estimates, the private training industry has trained over 2

million students last year. Definitely, there is a large role that the private

training industry is playing in making India an IT superpower.

Setting an example

Overseas interest A delegation from China visited India with a mission to

find out how India had grown its IT industry take tips to advance its own IT

industry, which was lagging behind India.

They saw the contribution the non-formal training sector had made to the IT

industry and were interested in repeating the same in China. In fact, the role

played by the IT training industry has been acknowledged worldwide.

International universities and governments like South Korea, Nigeria and El

Salvador are sending students to Aptech for three months to one year to complete

a course in IT. This speaks volumes about the impact of the IT training industry

on the growth of the tech revolution.

The IT revolution that has swept the country in the last five years owes a

lot to the private training industry–the boom in software exports created a

shortage of manpower; the resultant gap between demand and supply could never

have been bridged by the formal sector of education. The private sector training

institutes contributed in a big way to bridge this gap.

Today, many of the software and user industries rely on trained manpower from

private institutes to source their requirements.

The eighties boom

If we talk about the roots, as the IT industry in the country grew in the

early nineties, there was a lot of interest among students for a career in

information technology. This was the period when large IT training and education

organizations mushroomed and started offering long-duration career-oriented

courses that became popular with undergraduates. Students took up these courses

along with their normal graduation courses–the idea was that by the time they

graduated, they would also have professional qualifications in IT. And on the

strength of those qualifications, they stood a better chance of securing jobs in

the IT and user industries.

It was in the eighties that the IT training and education industry received a

boost and relaly came into its own. There was a need to train students in the

latest technologies, and the formal education sector was not geared up for the

task. What was it that was holding them back? Incorporation of new technologies

into the curriculum, upgradation of infrastructure and facilities to keep them

in sync with changing technologies was a tall order–this is where the private

sector jumped in. They have never looked back.

Pramod Khera is CEO, training and

education business, Aptech