There goes a famous quote which says, “Scientists dream about doing great things. Engineers
do them.” In fact, just the above saying is enough to comprehend the efficiency of engineers. Yet
there exists a growing stereotype in India that, becoming an engineer is of no worth in the
forthcoming years. Why is this so?
According to the sources, around 1.5 million engineers are graduated every year from various
colleges. Among them, only 3% are employed in their own field. Others are either employed to IT
companies irrespective of what they study or they are left unemployed.
Statistics state that most graduated engineers are unemployed. Some of them are under-employed.
The reason behind this is that despite being qualified as an engineer they lack creativity and good
communication skills. With their eye glued on to their phone screens, they fail to interact with the
society, thus ending up with poor communication skills. The biggest communication problem is we
do not listen to understand but we listen to reply. Every Tom, Dick and Harry runs behind the same
piece of cake and ends up with nothing. Students blindly try to learn what is given in the textbooks
without attempting to know the essence of it. They neither know nor want to know the practical
application of what they study. Students alone cannot be blamed for this. Even parents, teachers and
the government have an important role to play.
Most parents are interested in making their children pursue their dreams instead of allowing them to
pursue their passion. Parents dream of making their children an all-rounder by admitting them in a
lot of extra curricular activities and finally end up making them the so-called usual engineers.
Teachers are also not updating themselves with the present day educational developments. Thus
parents and teachers must change their way of approach towards the children.
On shifting the focus to the government, the government must take steps to look into the talent of
the students rather than looking into their marks. It must also foster student entrepreneurs and
provide them with the necessary supports.
As a matter of fact, India does produce a large number of engineers every year. But the most
talented among them fly abroad failing to work for our nation. As a result, India was a developing
country and is still a developing country.
On the whole, it is not that engineers are unemployed, it is only that they are not employable. Thus it
is every engineers sole responsibility to determine their own employability. I would like to quote what
Brian Corby has said here, “We may not be able to offer long term employment, but we should try to
offer long term employability.” This is the ultimate need of the hour.