Search For Employment: Colleges not offering enough placements, students turn to job agencies in Chandigarh

WITH ACADEMIC sessions drawing to an end, students at city colleges can now be seen searching for job opportunities. While many rely on the college placement cells, a lot of students in the Tricity have started knocking at the doors of job consultants and employment agencies to secure jobs.

Lack of adequate opportunities at placement drives in colleges has led to an increase in the number of students turning to seek employment options from such agencies. Says Parth Aghi, a student of DAV College, who has approached an employment consultant to look for job opportunities, “Colleges do not have very active placement cells, which is why employment is not really guaranteed there. Of late, however, placement agencies in the city have been doing a good job of helping students get in touch with companies for jobs.”

While some online employment portals do not charge the students anything for their services, other agencies charge a registration fee in order to put students in touch with potential employers. Further, if students get employed with the help of the services offered by these placement agencies, the students are also required to pay their salaries of seven to 20 days to these agencies.

One such placement agency, Dolphin Head Hunters that boasts of specialising in IT and non-IT placements for students, charges students a registration fee of Rs 500 for a two-month-long membership. “Once a student has registered with us, we put them in touch with potential employers on the basis of their qualifications. We only promise them to arrange their interviews, the rest is up to them. If they get employed, they are also required to give us a week’s salary after their date of joining,” says an official from Dolphin Head Hunters.

Another such company, T&A Solutions, offers its services to students free of cost. “Students are required to create an account on our website, and upload job-related details on the site, which then get saved in the database. Their work abilities are then matched with the listed job openings on the website on the basis of their preferred cities, and accordingly interviews are scheduled,” says Pradeep from T&A Solutions.

“We do not charge the job seekers. Instead the companies that get listed on our website pay us for putting them in touch with potential employees,” Pradeep adds.

Even though such employment agencies do not assure 100 per cent employability, the number of students turning to these agencies has only increased over the years. Explaining the reason for more students seeking job opportunities through such portals, Anant Gupta, owner of a placement agency in Chandigarh, says, “The reason why students are turning to such employment agencies of late is because we offer them individual attention and give them time unlike what happens in college placements. The college placements only take in the best of students, what about the rest?”

“The problem is the lack of enough opportunities in our colleges. We all want jobs, one way or the other. If shelling out money to these agencies helps us get in touch with employers, there is no harm in that,” says Mehaik Soin, a BCom graduate looking for a job.