Opinions of Indian Engineers would like to tell a truth that is a bit difficult to digest for all youngsters who wish to take up higher studies after completing their higher secondary school level education. Perhaps it would be more unpalatable for their parents.
But the truth is that engineering education is not a ticket for securing a guaranteed employment securing a comfortable job in India any more.
The biggest blunder made by the Indian governments (both central and the states) in the last couple of decades is perhaps their decision to allow the mushrooming of engineering colleges in the length and breadth of the country and allowing unscrupulous people to en-cash the so-called premium the engineering profession enjoyed in the society in the past.
What they apparently failed to recognize was the type and reason for the sudden rise of high paying employment opportunities for Indian engineers in those days. It was caused by the decisions taken by the US government to outsource much of the non-challenging but labor intensive computer code re-writing works of that country to the cheap technical labor in the third world countries. It was called the Y2K boom (for employment) in the IT sector.
Shrewd Indian business houses quickly took up this great opportunity and created large corporate entities that depended mostly on human capital and converted the wage disparity in the US and India to their full advantage. In their enthusiasm for mass recruitment of technically oriented manpower to be re-trained as computer coders, programmers and system analysts, they began to suck out all the engineers that were getting trained in India regardless of they being in any discipline of engineering. It was easy for them to pay higher wages from the average Indian salary of engineers because of the wage disparity in the US and India and the higher purchasing power of the dollar.
The liberal attitude of the US government in giving job visas for technically skilled foreign man-power to work in that country helped the job provider nation and the job seeker nations. The US could deploy their highly talented and scarce brain power to high technology research field that ensured that country's technological and engineering superiority over all other nations. The lower end and routine engineering jobs either got outsourced or replaced by foreign engineers. The foreign engineers in turn got much higher wages as compared to their own countries and also an opportunity to be permanent citizens of a highly developed nation.
India gained from scarce foreign exchange. India also gained from better access to used up technologies which other wise was not easily accessible. There was a big economic boom with India gaining much, though the gains were limited to the affluent populace. That affluence lured the aspirations of the middle class and the lower middle class Indians who thought engineering education as the magic solution for enhancing their social status and financial strength. Those Indians were too willing to send their children to engineering education at whatever be the cost. They refused to recognize the simple fact that engineering is not computer code writing. They also refused to recognize the fact that engineering studies needed some essential IQ level and aptitude. They believed that money can earn the engineering degrees and the engineering degrees can bring the dollars.
This attitude of the average Indian got converted to the establishment of English medium private schools and private engineering colleges, both extracted huge sums of money as approved fees and unapproved 'under the table' donations!
All the better IQ Indian boys and girls aspired to get in to the so-called premier engineering institutes as they believed it as the winning formula for their future citizenship in the USA. The next grades got satisfied with lower paid but sure shot employment in some of the IT companies of India who essentially functioned as IT contractors for the bigger multinational corporations.
But no one cared for the rest of the millions of engineering graduates whose parents spent their life time earnings to get them get those use-less engineering degrees!
No one also seem to be caring to know about the fate of Indian companies and organisations who cannot pay dollar equivalent salaries but are in the need of skilled engineers to do the actual work of engineering!
The conventional higher college education and the school education system of India are in shambles. More than 50% of the Indians now cannot afford these. Even if they do, it is merely useless and cannot guarantee them any worthwhile employment. When the millions of engineers are on the streets looking for jobs, what hope they can have?
The social media is discussing issues like 'what is the cause for unemployment in engineering in India?' . If you are still inclined to become an engineer you should read these before you decide.
All at the same time there is a serious shortage of engineers with requisite skills. Unfortunately, neither the IITs nor the other engineering colleges teach their students any specific skills that can make them job ready.
For the shrewd and high IQ fellows, getting employment or self employment is not much of an issue. They have it in their brains. They know how to go ahead. But such genius fellows are a small percentage in any society. We need not worry about them.
But for the larger stock who need proper guidance, we need to worry. They are also much needed for any nation to progress and maintain its well being.
For that to happen we need to strengthen our conventional production and service industries and organizations and find ways to enhance their incomes so that they can train and pay their people well.
And that will not happen unless the government facilitate them. Market forces alone will not do the job!
It is important to remember that the natural law is survival of the fittest. But that is also called jungle raj and not human raj!
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