"I joined TCS with a fake experience certificate but six months after I started work, they found out about it during the verification procedure. I have been asked to resign," said Ranjit (name changed to protect anonymity). He claimed he knew of at least two others working in his project team, who had also joined using fake certificates.
Ranjit feels that candidates mainly resort to such practices as companies refuse to give jobs to freshers. There are more candidates for fresher positions than jobs available, he said.
However, it is an open secret in the IT sector that about 15 to 25% of candidates come in and work using fake experience certificates. Some, it is known, even produce fake degree (mostly master degree) certificates to secure jobs.
In the second week of August, Mahindra Satyam reportedly lodged a complaint with the Madhapur police against 15 of its (now former) employees who had duped them by submitting fake experience certificates. Police booked cheating and forgery cases against the culprits under sections 420, 468 and 471 of the Indian Penal Code ( IPC).
"By the time the complaint was lodged, the accused were already sacked and had left the city. A majority of the accused were from Bangalore and Tamil Nadu. We are trying to track them," said Madhapur inspector Srinath Reddy to TOI.
K Vijay Kumar, team leader at a prominent IT MNC said however, that not all companies fired employees after finding out about the fake certificates. "Small companies do not sack such candidates. If they are found capable and deliver the product on time, even if their experience certificates turn out to be fake, they are not fired. Some big companies however, do ask the employees to resign voluntarily or sack them. However, lodging a police complaint for fake experience is a new trend, and freshers are advised to be more careful now," said Vijay.
Several MNCs utilise the services of private agencies to conduct background checks on candidates. "In 50% of the cases, fake experience gets noticed only upon verifying by calling the previous company's registered numbers. But these days, most of the 'fake' candidates use the names of nondescript companies and give their friend's phone number. In such cases, only the companies with dedicated background verification teams can track such people," said Rakesh, who works in the HR department of an IT company on Rd. No. 2, Banjara Hills.