More and more of Indian business leaders are predicting severe job cuts through the impact of AI.
After Inmobi CEO Naveen Tewari had said that 80 percent of the code at his company would be automated by the end of the year, leading to job cuts, Atomberg founder Arindam Paul has also predicted a bleak future for knowledge workers with the advent of AI. Paul believes that 40-50 percent of white-collar jobs in India could be lost in the coming years. He says that his could lead to a demographic disaster.
“I don’t think most people including our leaders still understand how big a threat AI could be to our economy,” Paul wrote on X. “Our manufacturing is no where close to where it should be when it comes to generating jobs that pay 3-6 lakhs per year. Our IT services and BPOs will see big reduction in manpower and in many cases in their business,” he added.
“While I think companies like Infosys etc will survive and some might even thrive, but even in that case, they won’t be employing nearly as many people as they do. Almost 40-50 percent white collar jobs that exist today might cease to exist And that would mean the end of the middle class and the consumption story,” Paul said.
“While all corporates are today happy that AI will reduce manpower and increase efficiency and improve bottomline, they forget that without jobs and money in consumer hands, there will be no topline. I hope none of this happen and we continue to grow our GDP both at an absolute level as well as at a per capita level, but I also think this is the most probable scenario for India unless we really double down on manufacturing,” he added.
The Atomberg founding member said that it was important for authorities to do something to prevent this from happening. “Really hope we take some steps. A poor nation of 140 crore people with many of them in the working age, but with no jobs, will be a demographic disaster of unimaginable proportions,” he said.
It’s a persuasive argument. India’s middle class is largely made up of knowledge workers, including call-center employees, programmers, analysts and the like. But AI could end up causing severe job cuts in these areas — many of these jobs will likely be fully done by AI in a few years, while others might require a lot fewer human workers. Meanwhile, India’s manufacturing hasn’t really taken off — manufacturing’s share in India’s GDP has remained stagnant at around 16-17 percent over the last decade. And with white-collar work looking poised to be disrupted by AI, it could end up putting all kinds of pressure on India’s workforce — and lead to many undesirable spill-over effects — in the coming years.