CHANDIGARH - Punjab-based Rayat-Bahra Group of educational institutes has tied u p with IBM India to give specialised training to its engineering students, it was announced here Monday."There is an immediate need to bridge the gap between industry needs and academics, and this is our firm step in that direction," Gurvinder Singh Bahra, vice-chairman of the Rayat-Bahra Group, told reporters. "This is for the first time that IBM has signed an MoU (memorandum of understanding) with any educational institute in Punjab. They have drafted a specialised training programme for our engineering students to enhance their job prospects in the market," he added.

Students can opt for this training programme of 140 to 200 hours in their fourth year of engineering and they have to pay very nominal fees for that, Bahra said.

Added Nitin Singhal, head (South Asia Pacific) of software services, IBM Global Services: "IT companies are always in need of trained professionals and their demand is rapidly increasing. So to avoid a situation when we have to wait for trained engineers, we have initiated this venture to fulfil our need."

He added that students, who "undergo this training, would certainly have an edge over others during placements".

During the programme, the students would be trained by five IBM software brands- Tivoli, DB2, Lotus, Web Sphere and Rational.

Rayat-Bahra group has 26 educational institutes in Punjab and five engineering colleges in different towns of the state.