Tresspassers will be recruited !

The recent issue of The Economist talks about the shortage of brain power around the globe. It was an interesting read, because there is so much competition in every possible sector that I was under impression that we have more brain power than needed. But the brain power they defined is not lower level clerical (read computer skills here!) but more of middle or upper level managerial skills. And, they argued that the universities (at least in US and in Europe) are not producing ‘talented’ people but more of literate people. The most interesting thing is they argued that the corporate world even in India and China is furiously trying to get hold of talent.

The argument seems to be contradictory to the situation in India. The companies are hiring people left and right. All they need is a graduation degree and they will be happy to recruit for all sorts of jobs. With over a billion people (and millions of useless Bangladeshis!) and almost 2.7 millions graduates every year, it seems that we are too many talented people in India. But reality always throws the perception off the balance.

Talent can be defined as knowledge necessary to succeed in the current world. Thus the number of students graduating from India may sound staggering but the percentage of graduating students with relevant set of skill is tiny 11%. According to the recent report of NASSCOM, only one out of four undergraduate in India is eligible for any kind of IT job. The unemployment rate among graduates is 17%. That means, India is producing staggering number of inept graduates. Who’s fault is it? It’s definitely not students fault but rather the government is extremely incompetent in providing any sort of useful education.

As far as outsourcing is concerned, we don’t have to worry about dollars inflow for at least another decade or so. The outsourcing expenditure is going increase from current $193 Billions to $260 billions by 2009. And that’s why we see so much desperation in grabbing anyone with a degree. As the firms that are on the forefront of outsourcing business start making forays into the first division product development, the talent deficit is going to be detrimental to their growth.

By the end of year 2000, the tech bubble went bust in US. There was greate pressure on American companies to save money in downturn economy. India was like a god given gift to the American multinational firms. With English speaking working class and passion for work, India poised itself correctly to tap the out-sourcing dollars. But if we don’t build the second floor i.e. knowledge, industrial and infrastructural base on this dollar flow then we will miss the bus of 21^st century.

Cursory glance on our education system and it’s clear that road to our dream of leading 21^st century is full of pot-holes. Though primary education is provided free by the government and it’s the constitutional right of every child, the system itself is in ramshackle. The teachers are underpaid and over-stretched. More ever, the students are missing too! We don’t have standardize testing or evaluation system for the whole country. Most of the school even in the cities lacks labs for computers or physics. We don’t encourage students to participate in extra-curricular activities. Rather than learning we focus more on getting grades in the exams. I haven’t even started talking about deficiencies on high-school and college level education. It will require separate blog.

But instead of working on the development of primary and higher education, our government is busy in introducing reservation policy in every facet of civil life. The vote bank politics is turning draconian and it seems another generation of talented individuals will be gutted in its self-consuming fire.

I often get forwarded email of Mr. Manmohan Singh’s resume. There is no doubt about Mr. Singh’s brilliance or his accomplishments but sadly, he will be remembered as a Prime Minister who forced more reservation policies rather than developing our knowledge base. Last time I heard, he was setting up a committee to enforce the reservation policies in private sector.