How to get hired
"C++ developer" covers at least five different careers in India. They share a language and almost nothing else, so name your target before you prepare.
Semiconductors and chip software
Qualcomm, NXP, ARM, Intel, AMD, Texas Instruments and similar companies run large design centres in Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Noida. The software side writes drivers, firmware, board support packages, compilers and test frameworks for chips. They hire freshers mainly through campus at engineering colleges, with ECE, EEE and CSE all eligible; laterals usually come via referrals. Interviews go deep on C: pointers and pointer arithmetic, memory layout of a struct and padding, volatile and why it matters for hardware registers, bit manipulation (set, clear and toggle a bit; count set bits), interrupts and what you must not do inside an interrupt handler, and Linux device drivers for experienced roles. Python is asked alongside, because test and build tooling is written in it. If this is your direction, also read the embedded and IoT and VLSI guides.
Automotive software
Bosch, KPIT, Tata Elxsi, Continental and the engineering-services firms build software for vehicle electronics: engine and brake controllers, infotainment, driver assistance. The words in these job posts are AUTOSAR (the standard software architecture for car electronics), MISRA C (coding rules for safety-critical C), ISO 26262 (functional safety), CAN and LIN buses, and tools such as Vector CANoe. Interviews test embedded C, RTOS concepts (tasks, priorities, semaphores, priority inversion) and how you would debug a timing bug on a target board. Pune, Bengaluru and Chennai are the automotive software hubs.
Systems software at large tech companies
Google, Microsoft and Amazon hire C++ engineers for browsers, databases, storage, operating systems and performance-critical services. These are product-company interviews: data structures and algorithms in C++, then system design, plus C++ depth (virtual functions and the vtable, RAII, smart pointers and ownership, move semantics, the rule of five, STL containers and iterator invalidation, and undefined behaviour).
Low-latency finance
Trading firms and some banks in Mumbai, Gurugram and Bengaluru write trading systems in modern C++ where microseconds matter. Interviews are the hardest in this list: C++ templates, memory allocation, cache behaviour, lock-free structures, plus maths and probability puzzles. They hire few people and pay at the top of the market. Strong competitive-programming records help here more than anywhere else.
Games and graphics
Studios using Unreal Engine work in C++. The Indian games market is smaller and pays less than the other four, but a playable demo on itch.io or GitHub gets you an interview faster than any certificate.
What to build
Pick projects that match the track: a driver or firmware on an STM32, ESP32 or Raspberry Pi board for embedded; a small shell, memory allocator or key-value store for systems; an order-book simulator for finance. Use Git, write a Makefile or CMake build, and run it under a debugger (gdb) and a memory checker (Valgrind or AddressSanitizer). Interviewers often ask how you found your worst bug.
What the work is like
Build-and-debug cycles are slower than in web work. Embedded developers spend hours in labs with boards, oscilloscopes, logic analysers and JTAG debuggers. Automotive teams follow heavy process: requirements traceability, code reviews against MISRA, safety documentation. Systems engineers at big tech fight performance and crash bugs in huge codebases.
The ladder runs Software Engineer, Senior, Staff or Lead, then Principal or Architect. Deep specialists (a kernel engineer, a compiler engineer, a functional-safety lead) are hard to replace, and pay reflects it.