As the $60-billion domestic IT industry braces to announce its July-September earnings later this month, some good news has started pouring. The industry, which is one of the largest employers in the country, is witnessing increased hiring reaching the pre-slowdown levels.

The online job index in the IT sector moved up by 45% from 718 in September 2009 to 1,047 in September this year, shows a survey by naukri.com, one of the leading online job portal. Interestingly, the overall job index moved up only by 22% in September this year compared to the same time a year ago.

?Hiring activity in the IT sector is back to the pre-recession levels. Key IT players in the country are acquiring multiple projects from India as well as overseas which has led to this boom. Software professionals can hence look forward to a favourable hiring environment over the next few months,? said Hitesh Oberoi, CEO and MD, Info Edge that owns naukri.com.

Predicting future optimism in the industry, 78% recruiters from the IT sector indicated that new jobs will be created in the second half of 2010. The hottest skill sets for the month of September were software development and sales and business development where the index moved up by 3% and 2% respectively. Demand for IT professionals, customer service executives, software developers and engineers were the hot spots for hiring.

Even monster.com, a global online employment solution company, reveals that the IT sector saw significant rise in online recruitment activity for the second consecutive month. The sector also registered a robust 52% six-month growth.

?In September, Indian employers returned to the recruitment market in substantial numbers following the summer months? lull in activity. The long-term trends in the Index continue to track the country?s economic expansion, with a rise in hiring for sectors like IT, ITeS, engineering suggesting continued strength in business activity,? said Sanjay Modi, managing director (India, West Asia, South East Asia), Monster.

Naukri.com vice-president (marketing) Sumeet Singh said the maximum number of jobs demanded IT professionals with 4-8 years experience as campus hiring is over. Agrees leading HR firm Ma Foi Randstad director and president E Balaji, ?All IT companies hired freshers last year and are now looking at talent with specific skills to support their growth. Moreover, the first wave of hiring was in big companies and now we see mid-size IT companies playing their cards right.?

Breaking the trend in the past, other cities apart from Bangalore also created significant jobs. Chennai with a 12% month-on-month growth led the major metropolitan markets in online job growth followed by Hyderabad with 8%. Jobs market in Bangalore exhibited sizeable improvement, growing 7% over the previous month. This is the first positive monthly growth in online opportunities in Bangalore since May, 2010.

The month also saw job opportunities rebounding in Delhi-NCR. Among all cities, Coimbatore witnessed the strongest monthly growth even in September while recruitment levels dipped only marginally (1%) in Jaipur indicating improved conditions when compared to the previous two months.