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US NRIs returning to fill IT manpower shortage in India |
Business leaders have warned that India’s information technology (IT) industry is heading towards a severe shortage of highly-skilled manpower and the country will not be able to achieve its targeted growth rates if the issue is not tackled immediately, a conference in Hyderabad was told.
Software industry body Nasscom President Kiran Karnik warned that India faces a shortfall of half a million skilled workers by 2010. The IT industry in India needs something like 350,000 engineers per annum, but only 150,000 highly-skilled engineers are available each year.
At present, the IT and Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industries in India employ 1.3 million people. This year India’s software exports are expected to reach $30 billion while the domestic software business is likely to be worth $7-8 billion.
Intel (India) president Frank B. Jones told the conference that it was becoming more and more difficult to find the required skills among graduates in India and so companies like Intel had moved to attract skilled NRIs settled in the US.
Jones said that about 10% of Intel’s work force had come back to India through that
programme. |
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Indian men are ‘poor lovers’: Survey |
Men from the land of the Kamasutra are not the best in bed. A global survey of over 40,000 men in 43 countries by Men’s Health, a lifestyle magazine, said Korean men had sex the most number of times a week. Indian men fall behind, but are doing better than the world average which is 2.08.
Indian men apparently have 4.53 partners in a lifetime, compared with the global average of 7.65, except for the hot Brazlilian men who come in at 11.37.
As for fidelity, Poles are the most faithful husbands, with 63 per cent being true to their wives. Who can blame them, with the freezing temperatures they have most of the year. India scored 48 per cent, compared with the global average of 59 per cent, though 73 per cent of Indian males confessed to one-night stands (frequently one would expect.) Portugal leads in this category with 81 per cent on this dubious stat.
As for the coveted foreplay, the Brits said 17.44 minutes was average. Indians clocked in at 15.78 minutes.
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Indians top international students enrolment in US
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Despite a 5 per cent overall drop, India continues to be the top place of origin for international students coming to the United States for higher studies for the fifth year in a row.
According to the latest ‘Open Doors 2006 International Students in the United States’ report released recently, India sent a total of 76,503 students to US to study in 2005-2006, a decrease of 5 per cent from the previous year (80,466), followed by China, Republic of Korea, Japan and Canada.
Students from the leading four places of origin—India, China, Korea and Japan—comprise 42 per cent of all international students enrolled in US higher education. Out of this total, Indian students accounted for 13.5 per cent of all foreign students, followed closely by China (11.5 per cent) and Korea (10.4 per cent).
Among the foreign-born, the Indian figure went up to 2,06,000 this year as against 1,44,000 in 1997—an increase of 62,000, according to the Office of National Statistics figures.
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Record number of NRIs win in US mid-term polls |
With mid-term elections just over, a record number of Indian Americans succeeded in their campaigns to win in their state districts.
Bobby Jindal won his race to Congress in Louisiana with a huge majority of 87.9 per cent. Jay Goyal, a 26-year-old Democrat, won in Ohio. Raj Goyal, 31, also a Democrat won in Kansas. Minnesota State Senator Satveer Chaudhary, retained his seat. When Chaudhary was elected to the state House of Representatives, he became the first Asian American to be elected to the Minnesota Legislature, and four years later he was elected to the state Senate, making him the state’s first Asian American Senator. In Iowa, Representative Swati Dandekar, 53, won for the third time.
Maryland became the first state to elect two south Asians to the state legislature—State House Majority Leader Kumar Barve from his district and Pakistani American Saqib Ali from his district. Both candidates are Democrats. |
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Indians outnumber ethnic minorities in London |
One third of people living in London were born outside the UK and Indians are the largest group among this foreign-born population, according to official figures released in November.
Out of a total population of 73,48,000 as on June 30 this year, the British-born in London accounted for 5,060,000—155,000 less than the figure on June 30, 1997.
The number of overseas-born residents now stands at 2,288,000, a record 31.1 per cent of the total population of the city and over 650,000 more than in 1997.
Among the foreign-born, the Indian figure went up to 206,000 this year against 144,000 in 1997—an increase of 62,000, according to the Office of National Statistics figures. |
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