How serious is the situation of background screening in India today?

The background verification in India has come to light around 1999, with the blooming of the banking, financial services and insurance sectors, and the growth of IT companies and BPOs. After that, the US companies working with their Indian counterparts started demanding background verification. They wanted to ensure the safety of their work in India. It is where this process has started experiencing exponential growth within the country.

In India, it has become a serious and important concern with the growing number of cases of employee fraud and misrepresentation of resume. This culture of getting people screened before recruitment has become a trend now but earlier the situation was not the same. Previously, it was largely in the companies with offshore offices, IT or ITeS and private sector banking and financial companies. According to the 2017-18 Economic Survey, there is an important need for a proper background verification process with an estimated 7.5 crore in the formal sector and the remaining 81 percent in the informal and agricultural sector, which is largely unregulated.

As mentioned, it is very important to conduct background screening policies as it will stamp out fraud candidates and give company quality employees. Additionally, it will also secure a company in case of any employee-related liability. Hence, these services also minimize the risk of damage to the company’s brand.

Frauds are usually from candidates who submit fake credentials. In one of the cases, the Dean of Admissions at Massachusetts Institute of Technology had to resign after it was discovered that she lied about her educational credentials on her resume back in 2007. She claimed that she has degrees from three different academic institutions but in reality, she didn’t have any degree. This was embarrassing for the institution as well. It also shattered the trust of the M.I.T. community.

Once the candidate’s basic credentials are verified at the time of onboarding, the risk of the candidate committing fraud or indulging in criminal activities is generally reduced but not eliminated. Therefore, companies should get criminal checks, credit record checks on a regular basis to make the system smoother and more robust. The Background Checks is not only important from the companies itself but it is important to get the background of the candidate verified from the third party as these days in India, reference checks are becoming redundant with the managers not saying anything negative about the candidate or breeding a culture of fraud by making business out of it with the help of the biased employees. This is greatly affecting the credibility of the organization. Also, it enhances the chances of fraud and crime in the organization.

The biggest challenge behind all these frauds that the country is facing is that we lack basic database infrastructure. In the US, the work is done by the click of a button but in India, we have an over-the-counter approach and the work is done manually.

The technology has made the job of the background screening easy. Today, there are various Background Verification Companies in Gurgaon that have come up with specialized services for background checks. But not all the companies have the audacity to deliver what people need. Also, if the screening is done by a good organization, then the situation can be better.