Axis Bank to increase campus hiring to up to 12,500 despite AI-driven staff shifts

Axis Bank, India's third-largest private lender, intends to expand its campus recruitment to roughly 12,000-12,500 new graduates in FY27, an increase from the 11,500-11,600 hires in FY26. While AI is automating certain low-level transaction-processing functions, the bank is opting to reassign affected staff instead of immediate layoffs. The institution's workforce fell by 3,116 to 101,337 in FY26, even though it added 31,665 employees during the year.

Its internal career platform, Thrive, now allows employees to apply for new positions after 16 months, boosting internal movement to about 65%, well above the industry norm. Attrition dropped to 22.4% in FY26 from 25.5% the previous year, attributed to higher productivity and new working models. Most of the upcoming hires will fill business, customer-facing, risk, compliance, audit and cybersecurity roles, with only 150-200 slated for technology positions.