Information technology workforce in India could grow to 2 million in 10 years, according to a report by merchant banking firm Goldman Sachs.
India's knowledge-worker population has increased to 650,000 software and services professionals currently from 6,800 in 1986, it said.
"Estimates point out that the supply of IT professionals will outstrip demand by 48,000 in 2008 suggesting that a healthy supply of IT workers will also curb wage inflation pressure," the report said.
"The potential number of jobs coming into Indian economy is a drop in the bucket for the Indian labor pool," it said, adding that employment in technology and business services is a tiny share of the total employment and about 60 per cent of the labour force in agriculture.
"IT professionals make up only 0.1 per cent of India's labour force," it said.
Although a significant proportion of the jobs offshored from the United States could go to India, it would not be an answer to the country's broader labour sector woes.
India's labour force will have about 520 million people over the next 10 years, up from 470 million currently.
Estimates of the potential number of 'US offshorable' professional services jobs range from 3 to 4 million over the next decade, the report stated.
Even if this number were doubled to consider potential offshoring jobs from other parts of the world, that would only represent 1.5 per cent of India's labour pool, a drop in the bucket, Goldman Sachs said.
Services employment is expected to rise to 107 million by 2007 from 102 million currently, i.e. addition of 5 million jobs. Employment in agriculture is expected to remain roughly stable at 190 million, it said.
Set against a backdrop of liberalisation during a period of global growth in demand for IT services coupled with global IT skill shortage, India's IT services exports benefited from a comparative advantage in knowledge workers with a specific set of software and language skills.
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