Flipkart, Paytm, Ola are not recruiting at IITs this year

Though the pre-placement offers at IITs are up by 25-30 percent this year, e-commerce giants like Flipkart, Paytm, OlaCabs, and Snapdeal have been conspicuous by their absence from the campus as yet.

According to The Times of India report, countries most prestigious institutions have witnessed a 50 percent fall in the number of startups that will be present in the campus recruitment drive.

Noticeably, All IIT Placement Committee blacklisted 31 firms, including Grofers, Hopscotch, Portea Medical and a host of other startups, from participating in their placement drives for making last-minute changes to their offers or revoking offer letters, and for falsely hiring them for affiliates and delaying joining dates.

Besides, the placement committee has been extra cautious this time around and all the startups are being screened by placement teams before they are allowed to visit the tech campuses. At IIT-Madras, 54 startups have registered compared to 98 last year. At IIT-Bombay, there are fewer startups among companies that have listed to recruit. "We are screening the companies that want to recruit from our campus," told a placement team member of IIT-Kanpur to the publication.

The parameters checked include funding, cash flow and the year of founding to determine the stability of the venture.

Some other startups who too have not yet signed up are Delhivery, Mad Street Den, Aura Semiconductor and Practo.

Apparently, the dual mix of blacklisting and a not so productive year for many startups has resulted in the number of firms not signing up for campus placement at IITs this year.