India Seeing More AI-Linked Hires Than Layoffs: Report

What this means for your job search: Prioritize developing and showcasing AI-related skills, as new hires are predominantly for AI work while support roles face automation. Emphasize your ability to contribute to AI initiatives to stand out in a cooling general IT market. India is adding more jobs linked to artificial intelligence than it is cutting. This is the key finding of a fresh report from Nomura Holdings, released this week. Nomura, the Japanese financial services firm, studied hiring and layoff data across Asia from 2022 through August 2026 to arrive at this number. The firm picked India as its main test case for judging how AI is changing jobs around the world. India runs as the world's back office for many global companies, and the report says the country feels the largest overall impact from AI right now. Layoffs, hiring freezes, and fresh recruitment all show up here more sharply than anywhere else in Asia. This makes India the place to watch if you want to see where AI and jobs are actually headed. Numbers Behind the Report Nomura pulled its findings from 69 anecdotes spread across Asia. In that pool, India recorded 83,100 AI-related hires against 31,921 layoffs and attrition cases. That gap sits at the heart of the report's main finding. Most of the job losses came from support teams, roles that chatbots and automated systems quietly took over. Hiring told a different story. The bulk of new roles went to IT services graduates, brought on specifically to keep up with rising demand for AI work . Nomura added a caveat here worth noting. Asia's labour markets remain fragmented, and much of this data came from news reports rather than verified company filings. The firm called the numbers a signal of a broader trend, not a precise headcount. A Mixed Picture Elsewhere Other data on India's job market paints a more layered picture. Layoffs .fyi found that India accounted for a sizable share of global tech layoffs in the first half of 2026, trailing only the United States. Job platforms tell a different half of the story. Naukri.com has tracked a sharp jump in demand for AI-specific roles, even as overall IT hiring growth has cooled off. Government estimates place India's annual AI hiring rate among the highest anywhere in the