A Parliamentary panel has flagged an “unusual decline” in placement of engineering graduates at premier engineering institutions such as the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs) between 2021–22 and 2023–24, and also expressed concern over “a decline” in average salary packages at the National Institutes of Technology (NITs) between 2022-23 and 2023-24.
Of the 31 NITs, 27 recorded a fall in average salary packages offered to engineering graduates in the academic year 2023–24 compared to 2022–23, with three of these institutes seeing the number fall by over ₹3 lakh per annum (LPA). The number of students placed at 31 NITs also dropped from 18,957 in 2022-23 to 16,915 in 2023-24, a decrease of 10.77%. Placements for the 2024-25 academic year is ongoing.
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“This year’s placement trends highlight a more skill-centric hiring process, the growing importance of internships, and deeper industry-academia collaboration, all of which mark a structural evolution in campus recruitment,” Professor Bibhuti Bhusan Nayak, head of career development centre at NIT Rourkela said. “Due to the ongoing placement cycle, the career development centre at NIT Rourkela is yet to compile and analyse the overall average packages and other relevant data.”
According to the data, 23 of the 25 IIITs, including five older IIITs, witnessed a drop in the placement in 2023-24 compared to 2021-22, with 16 of them seeing a decline of over 10 percentage points. IIIT Sri City, Chittoor witnessed an increase while placement data for IIIT Raichur was not available in 2021-22.
Interestingly, while these data points were discussed by the panel, they did not find a mention in the report itself, which restricted itself to the performance of the IITs. This data showed that 22 out of the 23 IITs, with IIT (BHU) being the sole outlier, recorded a decline in the placements in 2023-24 compared to 2021-22. IIT Dharwad recorded the sharpest drop of nearly 25 percentage points and IIT Kharagpur the smallest (2.88 percentage points). The drop was over 10 percentage points at 15 IITs.
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The observations were made in the report of demands for grants of the higher education department 2025-26 by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports, which was tabled in Rajya Sabha on March 26.
Officials at NITs and IIITs along with industry leaders said that there is a “structural evolution in campus recruitment” with companies focusing on skill-centric hiring process and evaluating students’ performances during internships.
Officials also said that emergence of new technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) have also impacted the placements in premier engineering institutes.
NIT Placements
Prof Bibhuti Bhusan Nayak, head of career development centre at NIT Rourkela said that the placement season in 2022-2023, and 2023–24 at NIT Rourkela reflects a “clear shift in both hiring strategies and industry expectations.”
“While the overall placement percentage in 2022–23 was around 88%, the figure in 2023–24 settled at 70.28%. Despite this marginal dip attributable in part to a cautious global hiring environment, the placement performance across key departments remained strong,” he said. While NITs and IIEST-Shibpur witnessed a hike in the average package from 2022-23 to 2023-24, the highest increase was just of ₹60000 from ₹9.90 lakhs a year to ₹10.50 lakhs at NIT Uttarakhand.
IIIT Placements
Out of total 25 IIITs, only five are centrally funded technical institutions (CFTIs); the other 20 are established on Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode.
A total of 18 IIITs, including the five CFTIs witnessed an increase in the number of students sitting for placements but saw a drop in placement percentage from 2021-22 to 2023-24. For instance, IIITDM Jabalpur witnessed an increase of 213 students who appeared in placements in 2023-24 from 2021-2,2 but recorded a placement drop of 10.71% in the same period.
The highest decline in placement percentage from 2021-22 to 2023-24 among the 23 IIITs is for IIIT Agartala, with a drop of 63.16 percentage points. The lowest decline in placement percentage is for IIIT (PPP) Kottayam, with a drop of 2.76 percentage points.
A total of 88.78% out of 2,924 students who sat for placements in the 24 IIITs in 2021-22 secured jobs.
However, only 71.32% out of 4,045 students secured placements across the 25 IIITs in 2023-24.
“There has been a decrease in the number of companies visiting the institute for placements now compared to previous years due to changes in the market trends because of new technologies like AI. We are preparing our students to adapt to market trends to improve placements,” a placement officer at a IIIT in South India said on condition of anonymity.
Arindam Mukherjee, co-founder and CEO of NextLeap –– a platform enabling professionals to switch to tech roles through fellowships, mentorship, and job support, said the industry-academia gap has been increasing over the years.
“Many companies avoid paying the skill premium (offering higher wages or bonuses for skills in high demand) just because of the IIT/NIT tag, and they hire candidates from Tier 2 campuses and later upskill them. A lot of companies hire for product manager roles and business analyst roles, but none of these premier engineering campuses equip students with the skills for these roles. In most of these campuses, you will find at least 50% of the students taking online courses to boost their chances in placements,” he said.
Shantanu Rooj, founder and CEO of TeamLease Edtech –– an online learning and employability boosting platform, said that his company has collaborated with IITs, IIMs and other premier institutions for talent acquisition and academic partnerships.
“Automation due to AI tools has streamlined various processes, reducing the need for certain entry-level roles traditionally filled by engineering graduates. Educational institutions must adapt their curricula to equip students with these competencies, ensuring they remain competitive in an evolving job market,” he added.
The Parliament committee in its report recommended that the higher education department “initiate mandatory faculty development programs to improve teaching methodologies and bridge the industry-academia gap in a structured manner.”
