Mega jobs push off to a solid start: India Inc takes up internship scheme, kick-starts hirings

New Delhi: ITC, Reliance Retail, Adani Group, TCS, Coca-Cola, Eicher, Deloitte, Mahindra Group, Maruti Suzuki, PepsiCo, HDFC, ICICI, Wipro, HUL, Samsung and Hewlett Packard are among 500 firms that have listed themselves as ‘partner companies’ for the PM internship scheme, launched on October 3.

Executives at some of these companies that ET reached out to said they are starting the process to hire interns across roles such as sales, marketing, entrepreneurship and farm-focused roles.

“Corporate houses would have to take this forward to create a multiplier effect,” said Vinod Aggarwal, managing director of VECV (VE Commercial Vehicles, a Volvo Group and Eicher Motors joint venture). “Either under the aegis of Eicher Motors or individually as VECV, we will on-board interns under the scheme, and are particularly keen on extending internships to women to increase diversity,” he added.

Irene Tan, vice president, human resources at Coca-Cola India and South West Asia, said the beverage maker is hiring interns to “tackle high-impact projects that test their strategic and creative skills.”

Candidates between 21 and 24 years of age, who don’t have full-time jobs, have passed a minimum of Class 10 and had annual household incomes of less than ‘8 lakh in 2023-24 are eligible to apply for internship under the scheme, according to information on the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) portal.

The scheme also excludes candidates who are post-graduates.The scheme offers a monthly stipend of ₹5,000 for a year to 10 million interns in 500 companies over five years.A senior executive at a large hiring firm said the stipend needs to be increased.

“The stipend amount is minimal and should be definitely increased to help youth who are not employed and incentivise applicants. Considering that large companies have onboarded as partners in the scheme, perhaps the companies may themselves increase the stipend amount,” the executive said on condition of anonymity.

A PepsiCo spokesperson said it is hiring interns with focus on women for sales, manufacturing and agriculture. “We have launched a movement, RevolutioNari, to empower women towards building economically independent lives, enabling them to take informed career decisions, provide upskilling opportunities in roles like sales, manufacturing, and agriculture,” the person said.

Interested candidates need to register and apply on the MCA portal, and their documents will be matched with companies’ requirements and shortlisted, following which companies will be able to select and hire them.

The Mahindra Group will hire 2,100 interns across multiple businesses, a company spokesperson said. Of these, the auto and farm equipment sectors at M&M will provide 1,000 internships each, while Mahindra Finance intends to hire 100 interns.

Skoda, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Franklin Templeton, Bajaj Housing, Emami, Jubilant Group, Max Life Insurance, Britannia, Procter & Gamble, Crompton Greaves, Tata Consumer Products, TVS, HDFC Life Insurance, Marico, Dabur, J&J, Colgate, Tata Motors, Godrej Consumer, Titan and Reckitt are among the others that have onboarded the portal as partner companies, with the numbers swelling from 111 on October 4 to 500 as of press time Sunday.

Some companies said they are in the process of finalising their hiring plans under the scheme announced by the finance minister in her budget speech on July 23.

“We are currently in the planning stage of its programme,” a spokesperson of audit and advisory consultancy Deloitte said.

_{Images are for reference only.Images and contents gathered automatic from google or 3rd party sources.All rights on the images and contents are with their legal original owners.}