1,258 JKC students find jobs with MNCs

Jawahar Knowledge Centres (JKCs), run by the Institute of Electronic Governance (a society under the information technology and communication department), in association with the IT industry, has seen 1,258 of its 6,058 students being employed by MNCs this year. It implies that around 21 per cent of the students trained by JKCs have been employed by MNCs like IBM, Satyam, Infosys and Wipro this year.

JKCs are centres that train final year engineering students in technical skills, soft skills and project management areas for a year. At present, there are 43 JKCs in 23 districts of Andhra Pradesh.

In 2005-06, students were charged Rs 1,000 per month for three months apart from Rs 1,000 as entrance fees.

This apart, it has been decided that students will also have to pay one month's salary to the centres, once they get a job.

Considering that the students who have been employed have got salaries ranging from Rs 2.04 lakh-Rs 3.14 lakh a year, this could lead to an outgo of Rs 17,000-Rs 26,167 from each employed student towards fees to JKCs.

Ratna Prabha, secretary, state IT department, said, "From 2006-07, JKCs will also start training students from degree colleges."

Plans are afoot to increase the number of JKCs to 61 in 2006-07, 110 in 2007-08 and 170 in 2008-09. It plans to train 1,40,000 students by 2008-09.