Debate: Is India not for IIM cream?

New Delhi: Foreign companies woo management students—Does this mean that in spite of all the high hopes about the Indian economy, are opportunities still better abroad? Joining CNN-IBN's Sagarika Ghose to discuss this are IIM-Ahmedabad Professor Anil K Gupta and IIM-Calcutta student, Prashant Swaminathan and Naukri.com COO, Hitesh Oberoi - who is an alumnus of IIT and IIM.

Sagarika Ghose: Is it premature to say that brain drain is reversing?

Anil K Gupta: No, I don't think so. I think the experience we have at IIM-A is very promising. In the last three years, the number of students who refused foreign postings and gave preference to Indian companies has troubled many companies, so this indicates that there is a small but significant trend that there are students who now find the same challenge in India as they get in companies abroad. I think people are factoring this issue much more importantly now.

I don't think the notion of brain drain holds true any more. It is reversing now to some extent and it will reverse even more in the times to come because more and more companies, which were hiring these students and asking them to come abroad are now also opening offices in India.

Sagarika Ghose:So what you are saying is that it a two-way traffic now. More people are coming and going than just all going away. Prashant Swaminathan, are the internships that students are applying for in foreign companies just stepping stones for jobs abroad?

Prashant Swaminathan: They are to some extent definitely, because companies when they hire these students, they look at them as long-term prospects and would like to hire them full-time.

Sagarika Ghose: What would you like to do? Would you like to go abroad or stay in India?

Prashant Swaminathan: I think it depends from person to person and case to case and in my case, I would like to go abroad initially because irrespective of what is being said about the Indian economy - yes it is booming - but if we look at the financial sector, then the West, especially New York and London are at least 5 to 10 years ahead of us. So it could give me a very good exposure as to the kind of products and variety and the experience would be immense.

But five years down the line, I would like to come back to India because that experience would be in good stead to continue a job in India.

Sagarika Ghose: Hitesh Oberoi, the Indian economy is booming and there are a lot of success stories, but aspiration levels are still high and the Indian economy is not being able to satisfy them.

Hitesh Oberoi: Well, things are changing. There are many more opportunities today than there were in the past. But yes, it's true that for certain type of jobs and for certain types of professionals, the opportunities today are truly global.

The markets abroad are far more advanced than the markets in India. So a lot of times, professionals who are highly qualified head abroad for more opportunities and not just the money.

It's more often than not, the challenge of working abroad with high-quality professionals. You learn more, the markets are more advanced, technology is more sophisticated and that's what takes them abroad.

Sagarika Ghose: This is the tier-one talent that you are talking about, whose lives and careers are totally global and it doesn't matter where these careers are. Is it the tier-two talent that is more susceptible to making choices?

BETTER OPPORTUNITIES
50 per cent IIM-B students going abroad for internships
100 IIM-B grads get overseas internships
35 per cent IIM-C students also going abroad to intern
93 IIM-C students have accepted jobs overseas
90 interns hired by 32 foreign firms from IIM-C
35 foreign firms have taken interns from IIM-C
In 2005, only 15 foreign firms had taken interns
Indian companies too have given internships abroad
20 per cent grads get hired by banking firms in UK & US
Stipend in India: Rs 90,000 to Rs 4.5 lakh
International stipends: $12000 to $22000

Hitesh Oberoi: See, between tier one and tier two, the salary differences are huge. In tier one, companies are willing to pay you whatever you want, no matter where you are. And therefore whether you are in India or the US, salary differences are not great.

But if you look at tier-two talent, salary differences are huge. An entry level software programmer in India still gets Rs 3 lakh a year, while maybe he can get Rs 25 lakh in the US. And that therefore is a no-brainer for him.

Sagarika Ghose: So tier-one talent is looking at a globalised career but at the entry level, salaries are no comparison between abroad and India. And why not go abroad if you can get Rs 25 lakh there instead of the Rs 3 lakh that is being offered in India.

In fact many of the IIMs are debating whether they should disclose the amount of salaries that their graduates are being offered. IIM Bangalore has decided not to reveal salary figures after many of their alumni received extortion threats last year.

IIMs of Calcutta and Lucknow say they will hold back the names of the students. However, IIM Ahmedabad says there is nothing wrong in revealing both the names and the salaries of the students.

Now Professor Anil K Gupta, Hitesh Oberoi was just telling us that there are two kinds of graduates—one is the crème de la crème who have totally globalised careers for whom the salaries are so high that it does not matter whether they are in New York or New Delhi, but there is the other type of graduate who is at the entry level point to whom it does make a difference. Perhaps these could be B-school grads - not necessarily IITs and IIMs.

Anil K Gupta: No, I think there are three kinds of students. There are some like you said who would go anywhere in the world and make a name for themselves - they are the born leaders, there are some who will do whichever job they get and then there is a third category of students who want to become entrepreneurs.

They see a tremendous opportunity in setting up their own enterprises in India. For them, no matter what the attraction is abroad, they will stay here because this is where they want to gain experience.

In fact, I believe that we should encourage our students to set up enterprises in India during their post graduate programme. And that would make them stay here for they will be able to test their ideas while they are students and there is a tendency to take more risks.

In fact I would like to argue that the day to celebrate for IIM would not be the day these students get high salaries but instead would be the day when we see the kind of investments global firms would make in these entrepreneurs' business plans.

Sagarika Ghose: Prashant Swaminathan, there is a dream that the IITs and IIMs stood for and still stand for and that is to provide talent to India. IIM was supposed to provide the managers for India. When a large number of students leave, don't they betray that dream?

Prashant Swaminathan: Not really. Like I said. I would like to come back to India after five years abroad, which I think is a great thing because if you had asked this to a student five years ago, they would have said they are leaving India for good.

We see entrepreneurs coming up and some people actually drop out of their summer and even final placements to stay back in India. So to say that we all move out of India is not correct.

Maybe 33 per cent to 50 per cent do move out but then there is 50 to 67 per cent who are still in India. They still carry on the dream and do a lot of justice to India. The percentage of people who do go outside - out of these many give recognition to the IIM brand abroad.

Sagarika Ghose: Hitesh Oberoi, if legislated quotas do come into the private sector, if by law quotas are established for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the private sector, what kind of a future do you then foresee?

Hitesh Oberoi: If that happens, then the opportunities for people who are genuinely talented will surely diminish and that will definitely lead to more brain drain.

Sagarika Ghose: Is the fear of that already leading to some amount of disquiet among those grads who seek jobs in the private sector?

Hitesh Oberoi: Not as yet, because a quota has not been legalised as yet, but if were to become a law tomorrow, then there would certainly be a lot of action in the job space.

Sagarika Ghose: Anil K Gupta, how do you respond to what Hitesh Oberoi says?

Anil K Gupta: No I don't agree with Hitesh Oberoi at all for the simple reason that the assumption here is that we are still looking for a small pie. We are not looking at the pie which is becoming bigger everyday.

India is growing and the pie is becoming bigger and therefore there is no reason to expect that the opportunities for the people that we produce in some of these elite institutions are going down. In fact, there are more people that we need than what we can supply. Indian corporations today can hire many more people than IIMs can supply.

Sagarika Ghose: But won't the student who is not eligible for the quota just up and leave?

Anil K Gupta: See India belongs to everybody. We want India to an inclusive society. Secondly to assume that the SC/STs do not have talent amongst them is also incorrect.

In fact the chairman of a very large corporate in the two-wheeler sector in India had mentioned sometime ago that nearly 30 per cent of the people working in his company were from backward classes.

Now if they can achieve market excellence by having one-third of their workforce from the backward classes, which just proves that excellence in the market place can be achieved by employing them as well.

Sagarika Ghose: Does will create excellence within the private sector? Prashant Swaminathan, what are the feelings among your peer group? What is the buzz at IIM-Calcutta. Do people say we want to go abroad or do more people think that let's give India a shot? What's the dominant trend?

Prashant Swaminathan: The dominant trend when I joined the institute was clearly to go abroad. But in the last two years, figures that have come out and with big foreign companies setting shop in India, the trend is definitely changing. What earlier had been an 80-20 equation is becoming 60-40 now.

Sagarika Ghose: Hitesh Oberoi, there is a feeling that after 9/11 there are prejudices against brown-skinned people, that American society has turned inwards. Is that daunting for the IIT, IIM graduates in their search for jobs abroad?

Hitesh Oberoi: I don't know about brown-skin but there is no prejudice against Indians. Today, American companies probably prefer Indians over several other nationalities because the Indian professional has made a mark for himself.

There is no reason for any prejudice at all because Indians have made it to the top in many companies in the US. There is no reason to suppose that opportunities abroad in any way are shrinking for Indians.

Sagarika Ghose: Well the world is the oyster for the Indian graduate of IIT and IIM as it always was. What used to be one-way traffic from India to the west has now become two-way traffic. Some are off and away, others are coming back.

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