India’s top software services company Tata Consultancy Services Ltd (TCS) on Tuesday announced plans to recruit 37,000 professionals in the next year through campus placements for its domestic and overseas operations.

The company has so far visited 171 institutions across the country, according to Ajoyendra Mukherjee, global human resources head.

TCS, which had hired 27,500 professionals through campus placements last year, has recruited 50,000 employees in the nine-month period ended December 31, 2010 and expects to add another 12,000 to 15,000 personnel in the fourth quarter.

“Our hiring ratio will be around 54:46 trainee and lateral respectively. The demand is strong and we hope it will continue to grow in the coming days,” Mukherjee told journalists.

TCS has a headcount of 186,914 at the end of December 31, 2010 after adding 20,219 employees during the third quarter, which is the highest addition yet.

“Given the strength of business demand, we have exceeded the hiring target of 50,000 employees we had set for this fiscal year,” Mukherjee said.

Our short-term challenge is we have to continue to retain people although the attrition rate has come down in Q3 FY 11, Chandrasekaran, chief executive and managing director said as the company faces a major challenge of containing attrition rate.

Earlier in the day, TCS lifted market sentiment on stock markets in India due to the company’s better-than-expected results on Monday helping the BSE benchmark Sensex move up by 210 points to regain the 19,000 level, despite sustained selling by foreign funds.

Shares of TCS touched an all-time high of 1207 rupees, 6 percent higher than Monday’s closing price before closing at 1200.55 rupees a share and registering a gain of 5.48 percent.

TCS Q3 net up 30 pct

On Monday, TCS posted a 30 percent jump in its third-quarter consolidated net profit at 23.7 billion rupees driven by strong demand for outsourcing services and stable fees.

TCS had recorded a net profit of 1,8.24 billion rupees in the October-December 2009 quarter.

Income from operations rose to 96.63 billion rupees during the quarter, up 26.34 per cent from 76.48 billion in the year-ago period. It added 35 new clients during the quarter.

Our ongoing performance has been the result of the sustained effort from all operating teams to focus on growth with profitability, said Chandrasekaran.

The company declared a 200 per cent dividend, the company said in a filing with the Bombay Stock Exchange.

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