Reliance hiring slump is calm before AI storm

MUMBAI: Finding a good job in India is going to get a lot harder. Headcount growth at its ​biggest private company, $190 billion Reliance Industries, is slowing sharply as an investment binge fades. But a chronic ‌skills shortage also gives businesses a strong incentive to rapidly adopt artificial intelligence. That will turn today’s hiring squeeze into a deeper, structural slump.

The energy-to-retail giant’s over 419,000 headcount as of March 2026 represents 4% year-on-year growth, just one quarter of its expansion rate the previous ​year. Its disclosures have turned hazier too: last year Reliance discontinued a table in its annual report offering ​a detailed breakdown of employees across business divisions.

The hiring slowdown is partly explained by the end ⁠of a phase of higher recruitment for its fledgling renewable energy business. But the growth remains well below India’s ​7%-plus GDP growth—and the squeeze could soon become entrenched: Reliance says it is “building talent fluent in leveraging AI to enhance decision-making, ​productivity and purpose-driven work”, implying that the impact of AI on hiring will become clearer next year.

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The problem is pronounced at IT outsourcers like $85 billion Tata Consultancy Services, the country’s second-largest company by market capitalisation, and Infosys , where the number of employees is now up to 5%, ​below their respective March 2023 peaks, thanks to a slowdown in revenue growth and rise of new coding tools.

Indeed, future ​job growth is a bigger worry than headline-grabbing layoffs, as the government’s Chief Economic Advisor V. Anantha Nageswaran warned in February. His ‌call on ⁠the private sector to hire more and balance capital-intensive growth with labor-intensive growth has gone unanswered by industry titans. Urban youth unemployment is as high as 13.6% and it’s common for college graduates to queue up for janitorial roles in the public sector.

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The danger is employers – who have long complained that India’s 600 million-strong workforce does not have the modern skills ​required for the service-oriented economy – ​will turn to AI ⁠as a quick fix and adopt new technologies faster. Some 65% of respondents to a World Economic Forum survey, saw a skills gap in India as a challenge to business transformation, and ​more than one-third of them expected talent availability to worsen over the five years ​to 2030. Indian ⁠employers plan to outpace global adoption in computing technologies, quantum and encryption to transform their businesses, according to the WEF’s Future of Jobs report for 2025.

It all threatens to tip India Inc’s hiring slump into a depression.