According to ancient literatures, vidya means clarity. Interestingly otherwise, education, as a Western concept means a process of receiving systematic instruction or gathering knowledge! This is exactly the paradox that our post-colonial education system is dwelling in! Are we emphasising on one’s capacity to gather knowledge or the ‘clarity’ of wisdom? The education system implemented by the colonial rulers in India was meant to churn out robots to serve the massive system without asking any questions. Unfortunately, the post-colonial rulers preserved the same system rather than exploring the already available education system in ancient India.
“My son has to be an engineer and nothing else!” This is a very common statement that parents in contemporary India keep repeating, across regional and economic segments. In engineering, IT-related fields are in demand. When I confront the parents to get an explanation for such a firm career option that they want their children to choose, most common reasons cited are the steady career growth, focused future, relative affluence and prestige. For them, here’s some shocking survey data that I would like to furnish. The national employability report (2012) compiled by Aspiring Minds, an employability solutions company revealed that only 17.45 per cent of technical graduates in the country are fit to be employed. What this also means is that the rest, that is, 82.55 per cent, engineering graduates are unemployable. The survey that was conducted among technical graduates who graduated in 2011 from various parts of the country revealed that among the five lakh engineers who graduated in 2010, only 17.45 per cent were employable. The bitter truth is that Class VII students are better than 50 per cent of India’s engineers when it comes to quantitative skills. The report further added that only 10 per cent of engineering graduates in Tamil Nadu recruited by IT firms are actually employable.
The conclusions are based on a survey conducted across 16 States. Another survey in 2013 by IIM Udaipur reveals that 75 per cent of engineering graduates in Rajasthan are unemployable. It is not just the technical knowledge, but in a lot of other areas, the students fail to impress the interviewers. The study was conducted in collaboration with the Working Group on Education and State Planning Board, Rajasthan. I am sure the survey would have yielded similar results in many other states in India. The MBA, as a career option is also not shining; only 10 per cent of graduates are being actually employable despite the robust demand for MBAs, says a survey by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM, 2013). Business Standard states that barring graduates from IIMs, B-schools are losing out on attracting India Inc.
The robotic and conventional education system does yield a large number of professionally qualified graduates from various courses, but most of them, beyond receiving instruction (and delivering accordingly), are unable to bring in directional benefits to the companies. Since the
subjects are largely skill-oriented, most of the graduates lack proper cognitive and spontaneous thinking capacity and hence lack in deliverance, unless being instructed. Innovation and out-of-the-box ideas are rare qualities.
In contrast to the stagnation of scope and employability of regular run-of-the-mill professional courses, the creative courses
(product design, graphic design, textile design, fashion design, etc) not only teach the idea generation process and out-of-the-box thinking, but also prepare students in presentation and communication skills. A report published in Economic Times (Feb 28, 2014) mentioned that IT companies offer up to 50 per cent higher salaries to design students than engineering graduates. The report states, Indian IT firms have been trying to scamper up the ‘value chain’ in the past few years, and the resultant increase in focus on verticals such as product design and emerging technologies like mobile and cloud are sending tech giants on a talent hunt to the country’s arts and design schools. With salary offers at a premium of well over 40-50 per cent given to engineering students, IT firms are making a beeline to recruit students from the like of the National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) and Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology, Bangalore. Compared to entry-level salaries of tech graduates, which are around Rs. 2.5-3.5 lakh pa, design students are being picked up by companies such as Microsoft, SAP Labs, Cognizant, Mindtree, Infosys, Wipro and InMobi, as well as e-commerce players such as Amazon, Myntra and Flipkart, for anywhere between Rs. 4-18 lakh, depending on the institute. At NID-Ahmedabad’s December 2013 placements, Samsung R&D recruited students at a salary of Rs.18 lakh, while Cognizant was the top recruiter with 20 students. Remember, these placements are apart from the companies that regularly recruit creative professionals (brands, product design labs, R&D centres, retail giants, e-commerce giants, buying houses and graphic design labs) across campuses every year.
Opportunities in creative fields are increasing faster with new streams being added every year. Some of the recent streams are User Interface design, Mobile app design, Trend forecasting, Styling, Fashion journalism, Fashion photography, Game design and Event management. The ever-increasing interest in entrepreneurship among graduates from design schools are phenomenal due to the global market requirement and innovative ideation process among the graduates. Also, investors are looking for unique ideas and business plans to invest. Hence, alternative careers in creative fields have better prospects than the conventional ones. Keeping our unique socio-cultural mix, the future wealth of India depends on ideation, research, innovation and storytelling capacity. The youth population, which is portrayed as a boon, can be a bane if we keep producing mindless robots. We will be then the biggest resource to provide physical labour to the developed nations, and nothing else.
Ref:indianexpress
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