NIIT has also set its sights on attaining global leadership position in the field of IT education and training by 2004. With its education revenues already worth Rs 625 crore, the software major has been ranked among the top seven independent IT education and training companies in the world.

"NIIT has been able to achieve this landmark due to its ability to continuously innovate, tenaciously deliver quality and consistently meet the expectations of its students and the IT industry," according to Mr. Dewang Mehta, president of the National Association for Software and Service Companies (Nasscom).

Mr Mehta said, "NIIT has done a great service to the country. It has not only created a pool of more than a million IT-literate persons but also provided some high-quality professionals to the Indian software industry." He hoped that companies like NIIT, along with formal educational institutions, can play a major role in fulfilling the increasing gap of supply and demand of quality IT professionals.

Talking on the growth of NIIT’s education and training network, Mr. Suren Singh Rasaily, senior vice-president and head of NIIT’s education and training business said, "The tremendous response from our customers has led to the creation of a burgeoning IT training industry. NIIT is also credited with pioneering franchising of education and giving entrepreneurship a new fillip by setting up over 1,000 centres in deep interiors of India and 25 other countries."

NIIT recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the World Bank on a student loan programme worth Rs 440 crore. This is the first step towards the creation of an education loan in India and will allow 40,000 students to benefit from this over the next five years. The loan has a unique pay-back scheme that allows students to repay once they start earning.

According to Mr. Rasaily, "NIIT’s unique business model enables us to offer the latest in technology by effectively utilising the synergy between education, training and software businesses. The experience gained while working on software projects is used to equip students with real-life situations making them hands-on practitioners. In turn, these practitioners provide the essential human resource input to create software solutions."

Besides, NIIT’s education has found widespread acceptance in the industry with over 5,000 companies employing NIIT students. The Infocom Development Authority of Singapore entered into an MoU with NIIT to recruit 1,000 qualified students from its global training centres in China, India, Indonesia and Malaysia for employment with Singapore-based companies.

NIIT, which pioneered the concept of IT education in 1982 with the opening of its first centre in Mumbai, today provides its quality computer education in 26 countries, including China, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Africa and the US. NIIT, which enrolled 322,000 students and professionals in the financial year 1999-2000, has today nearly 3.5 lakh students on its rolls.