There were 284 placement offers for the 267 graduating students this year, indicating that only a few got multiple offers. Last year, there were 586 offers for 256 students. The number of foreign placements has also gone down. Compared to 32 offers last year, there were just 15 foreign offers this time. Moreover, seven students opted out of the placements this time to open up their own ventures.

Prof Shushil Kumar, chairman, placement cell at the IIM-L, said: “The major impact is seen in the investment banking sector as the number of such recruiters has reduced drastically.”

“However, in times of recession, we have done fairly well. It is interesting to note that even in this scenario, the number of offers in the financial sector increased from 31 per cent last year to 40 per cent this year. Besides, there has been an increase in percentage of offers from the marketing companies from 18 per cent last year to 31 per cent this year.” Of the 267 students, 25 accepted pre-placement offers.

Public sector units were of great help. For the first time, 15 PSUs recruited 65 students. These PSUs included names like Coal India, which made 12 offers and the SAIL, which also recruited a similar number. Others included Bank of Baroda, Union Bank of India, ONGC, SIDBI, BHEL, NTPC, and GAIL.

Kumar said as many as 50 companies had come to the campus for the first time to recruit, including Siva Venture and Jaypee Capital, both of whom selected maximum number of students — 21.

The other first-timers were Loreal, Tholons Consulting, Virgin Mobile, Religare Securities, Darashaw and Co, Allergo Advisors, Eli-Lily, Jindal Steel, Kellogg etc. However, a few major recruiters were missing — Reliance Industries, Reliance ADAG and even consulting firms like Accenture.