That is what Infosys' [Get Quote] board member T V Mohandas Pai said when asked if there was any political interference in hiring talent across their centres in Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Chennai.

He said that "senior politicians" cutting across party and geographies call Infosys' top brass to recommend their candidates. While obliging these politicians their candidates are made to go through internal tests and "are hired only if they clear and satisfy our requirements."

"If tomorrow you recommend a name I will do the same," Pai told this correspondent while continuing to emphasise that it is only talent and skills that matter at Infosys and not recommendations.

Pai pointed out that his company has hired between 45 to 50 per cent locals at its Bangalore and Pune centres. What is more, the company plans to hire more than 25,000 people this financial year. He said that slowdown or no slowdown in the US, they will continue to hire. For the financial year that ended on March 31, 2008 the company increased its headcount to 91,187 against the total strength of 88,601 for the same period in 2007.

Responding to some politicians' demand of hiring 80 to 100 per cent locals Nandita Gurjar, vice president and group head � human resources said it would lead to a lot of problems. "There will be no diversity and what's wrong with the Chhole Bhatture kind of employees?" she said, referring to the diversified talent available to the Indian IT and ITES companies.

Pai admitted that Infosys' Pune centre would be delayed by another six months because of the labour problem following the political developments in Maharashtra. The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena's campaign against migrant labourers had led to an exodus of labourers from cities like Pune and Nashik last month.

The number of construction workers working at Infy's Pune site has come down to between 1,300 and 1,500 against 2,800 a few months ago, Pai added.

"Earlier, the centre work was delayed due to lack of cement and now we have a labour problem. In fact, we have a shortage of everything, including human talent," he rued.

While ruing the talent shortage Pai said India is currently a $1.2 trillion economy and is likely to almost double in size in the next six years even if it grows at a modest 7 per cent increase in GDP.

"This $2 trillion economy will need 64 million (6.4 crore) skilled workers. But currently we have only one million (10 lakhs) people that is a mix of skilled and semi-skilled people. How are we going to meet this shortfall?"

He said out of the total young people enrolled in Indian colleges only 18 to 24 per cent actually attend it. That compares badly with 40 to 52 per cent in Germany and 45 to 46 per cent in the US.

He emphasised that efforts must be made by the government as well as corporates to improve this ratio so that India five years down the road doesn't face the manpower shortage that it is facing today.