‘Quality of freshers is so bad’: Entrepreneur defends Cognizant’s

IT giant Cognizant has found itself in the eye of social media outrage after one of its job postings for freshers went viral. The job listing was for candidates from the 2024 graduating batch in IT. What irked people is the salary listed on the job posting—it’s ₹ ₹252,000 per annum. While most people spoke against it, a few supported the offer. Amid those, a post by an entrepreneur deafening the amount offered to the freshers has captured people’s attention.
It all started with a post by X page Indian Tech & Infra. “Cognizant has announced an exciting off-campus mass hiring drive, welcoming applications from candidates belonging to the 2024 batch. Application deadline – August 14. Package – INR 2.52 LPA,” they shared.
Quoting the X post, entrepreneur Vatsal Sanghvi listed reasons for supporting the job listing. He also questioned the quality of the freshers, adding that “ ₹20k/mo is overspending.”
In his post, Sanghvi added that the freshers don’t know how to communicate, code, or behave professionally. He also added, “It is an open market. Don’t apply if you don’t think it’s fair .”
“But you know what – we as a country want free money and the ones sitting in plush offices have an opinion on everything without having an iota of an idea about the ground reality,” he added and concluded his post.
His post didn’t sit well with most people, who slammed the entrepreneur for defending Cognizant’s job offer.
“It’s not a fresher problem; it’s your skill issue that makes you unable to find good quality freshers with growth potential,” wrote an X user. “And the quality of the CEO is worth 186 crores, right?” added another, referencing the salary of Cognizant CEO Ravi Kumar Singisetti.
“Instead of complaining about the quality of freshers, why don’t the companies plan on training them in college itself? Some weekend refresher courses. Have an exclusive tie-up with a few colleges and run your plan there free of cost. It will be a win-win for everyone,” asked a third.
A fourth person expressed, “I challenge you to live with 20k in Bengaluru for three months and then talk, there is something called dignity of labour, minimum wages… Nothing is applicable, it seems!”
According to LinkedIn, Vatsal Sanghvi is an alum of Bits Pilani and used to work at Flipkart. In 2023, he founded his tech company, 1811 Labs. He also has a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Level 1 certificate.