Bangalore, Nov. 17: Rahul Karmawat is hunting for a job. A middle-level manager with a global chipmaker, he has collected his severance package: three months’ salary.

The 35-year-old, who was earning around Rs 30 lakh a year, has not told his wife that he has lost his job.

“My wife does not know I have lost my job. I visit and follow up with at least two recruiters a day and often spend up to two hours in a park at the other end of the town before driving back. This is my routine five days a week,” he said.

For Karmawat, the reality of losing his tech job has begun to sink in. “Now, I cannot afford my earlier lifestyle despite having a house, car, shares and a big insurance policy,” he said.

Bangalore’s vaunted IT corridors have been feeling the ripples for the past month and a half as company after company has been announcing job cuts. Recruiters believe the real picture will unfold before the end of this quarter.

“The number of placement enquiries has doubled in the past few weeks. They come not just from those who are panicking but from those who have already accepted severance packages,” said Thomas Mathew, managing director of placement firm Amboseli HR.

His company specialises in placements for chip companies and research jobs. “Most global IT names had research facilities here. This is the area that has seen the most layoffs, often with manager-level jobs held by people between 33 and 40 years. More than 2,000 senior and mid-level people are without jobs. The challenge is to find placements for them in this atmosphere of uncertainty,” Mathew said.

Karmawat says he is ready to look at temporary contracts, an option that Mathew claims is being explored even by those with jobs, since it means extra cash.

“Earning extra money is like saving for a rainy day. You never know when the pink slip will arrive,” said a young engineer warming the bench at a big IT firm since his team completed a project.

“The project was extended by some deft manoeuvring by our bosses, else we would have been on the bench a few months earlier.”

Many IT companies have been stretching their projects by a few months and have instructed their business units to extend the delivery deadline.

The layoff numbers being mentioned around Bangalore are scary -- Freescale: 150, Sun Microsystems: 600, NMS Communications: 40, Conexant: 400.

“Often the numbers don’t tell the real story. It could be the number of people working in an Indian unit or it could be a global number. Either way, it has scared those employed in the industry,” said a recruiter who did not want to be named.

The trend of merger and acquisitions, too, has taken its toll since companies that acquire smaller businesses often become top heavy.

“This trend alone is responsible for at least a thousand senior jobs being cut. Most of them are still out there for several months now without jobs,” the recruiter added.

Some techies view the crisis as a purely American problem and feel this is the right time to move to safer jobs in Indian-owned and managed companies.

Priya Jain, 31, moved last month from US company Dell to an Indian firm located in the same building on Koramangala’s Intermediate Ring Road.

She said: “It was as easy as moving to another floor in the same complex. But what you get is a whole new way of working and a safety net, since Indian companies don’t just hire and fire.”