Fresh hiring trends among India’s largest IT companies are dominated by Tata Consultancy Services’ (TCS) restructuring exercise, although data compiled by The Indian Express shows that the top six firms in the sector shed less than 1,500 jobs in the first nine months of 2025-26 on a net basis. This was despite TCS and Tech Mahindra reporting large reductions in their employee numbers.
However, the remaining four major IT companies — Wipro, Infosys, LTIMindtree, and HCL Technologies — have added jobs this year. Infosys led in hiring, increasing its payroll by 13,456 so far in the current financial year.
“I think it demonstrates that we have confidence in where the market is and what we are seeing in terms of the demand,” Salil Parekh, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, said last week at the post earnings press conference. According to Jayesh Sanghrajka, Infosys’ CFO, the company is on track to meet its guidance from last year that it will hire 20,000 freshers in 2025-26.
“We have onboarded roughly around 18,000 freshers, and we are well on our way to finish our 20,000 number for this year, which, in a way, reflects in a headcount also because many of them are under training. And if you look at our utilisation, including trainees, has come down. So, that is our investment into building capacity for the future in a way,” Sanghrajka said on January 14. Meanwhile, Wipro has added over 8,500 jobs this year. The rise was primarily driven by two factors: completion of the acquisition of Digital Transformation Solutions in December 2025 and a long-term deal with the Phoenix Group, the UK’s largest long-term savings and retirement business.
“From a hiring standpoint and supply side, I do not see a challenge. Attrition has been at 2% low for the quarter. It is trending the same in the next quarter. We are going to go to the campuses again,” MD and CEO Srini Pallia said on January 16 in a post-earnings call with analysts. But he also warned on the demand front clouding the hiring outlook.
“There is no significant change in the demand environment, specifically the discretionary spend as uncertainty continues. January is the time when many of our customers will finalise their budgeting process. We will (then) have a much better understanding and view of where they’re going to spend. From a full year of visibility (regarding earnings), there is uncertainty in the market and customers continue to remain in wait and watch mode,” Palia said.
IT hiring cools on US slowdown; TCS exits not all layoffs
Hiring has been a difficult subject for IT firms recently compared to mass hirings in the past. Some changes in hiring patterns are due to uncertainty in deals from US-based clients, who account for much of the revenue of these firms. The Trump administration’s sweeping tariffs and continued policy uncertainty has led to US clients cutting costs and delaying IT services spending.
Even TCS’ fall in headcount requires a nuanced view as the total fall in number of employees may not mean they all have been fired as part of its restructuring initiative announced last year, focusing on cost optimisation and increased AI-adoption. While TCS net shed 25,816 employees in the first three quarters of FY25-26, this number is inclusive of voluntary exits too. For instance, in October-December, the firm “released” only 1,800 employees even though the net headcount fell by over 10,000.
“Wherever we are not finding success in re-deployment, is where we are releasing the workforce… And in this quarter, we released approximately 1,800 people with all the due care and compliance to all the laws of the land. And as communicated earlier, we expect it to continue into the next quarter as well,” Sudeep Kunnumal, TCS’ Chief Human Resources Officer, said on January 12.