The global success of the software industry in India clearly illustrates that Indian engineers can rival the best in the world. Software development provided vehicle to demonstrate this point, although for those who have seen the achievements in the nuclear, space and the missile development, this was obvious long ago. This image is strengthened by the observation that a number of Indian computer scientists have made it big in the US as entrepreneurs, either by climbing the corporate ladder or by being successful in academia after earning a postgraduate education in the US. It is equally true that an entrepreneurial spirit in India has also spawned a number of successful software ventures. It’s important to note, however, that actual software products from Indian firms have had negligible impact. India’s tech strength so far lies in its services.


India has had a long-standing tradition in the physical sciences, starting from the pre-independence days. Technical education began in a big way in the ’50s, thanks to the vision of then prime minister Nehru. The Sarkar committee created the five IITs, each of which produced excellent engineers with their state-of-the-art curriculum. In the same decade, Nehru — together with men like Bhabha, Sarabhai and Bhatnagar — created the infrastructure of space, atomic energy, and defense laboratories, which have legitimately made India a self-reliant country. Achievements like the Pokhran nuclear tests, launches of the Agni missile and the ISRO satellites are ample testimony of the high level of Indian expertise. To avoid drawing an erroneous correlation, however, it should be noted that success of these technologies relied very little on the graduates of the IITs. The basic background of most of those seeking admission to engineering schools is acceptable. The successful and well-prepared ones pass the entrance examination and are admitted into IITs. The rest get into other technical institutions. This is somewhat similar to the US, where there is fierce competition to get into the Ivy League or so-called elite schools. Recent research has shown that those graduating from these elite schools are better “connected.” In the long run, they are termed more successful, by many measures, than equally good students going through not-so-elite schools.
In the case of India, those graduating from IITs definitely have a better chance of getting into quality post-graduate schools. However, from observing the success of Indians in the Silicon Valley, it can be said that there are a large number of non-IIT professionals who are equally successful. Assuming that an IIT student stays in India, it is difficult to guess whether in the long run she or he will have an edge over other students. This is a point that authorities must consider before allocating resources to technical education within the country.

Choices, Solutions, Strategies
After the Sarkar committee report in the ’50s, there has been hardly any growth in the number of IITs. Out of nearly 1,20,000 students who take the Joint Entrance Exam, about 3,000 are admitted into the IITs. Judging by the law of large numbers, at least 10,000 should be entitled to a comparable education. Herein lies the tragedy of technical education: If proper adaptations had been made, the IITs should have had an output at least twice the output by the ’70s by incremental investments in the infrastructure. Current news reports suggest that the government is thinking of elevating some of the regional engineering colleges to the status of IITs, which is a step in the right direction and should be implemented as soon as possible. This move should be done with care. By ensuring that the syllabus of the RECs fall in line with those of the IITs and their equipment is also comparable. Most RECs have a good percentage of Ph.D.’s, thanks to the Quality Improvement Program, started in 1971, through which nearly 4,000 Indians obtained their M.S. or Ph.D. degrees from IITs. Even at a cursory glance (as well as from this writer’s experience), if the intake to IITs and similar quality institutions is 10 percent of those taking the entrance exam, the country would have a much better technical manpower pool at the bachelor degree level. Those aspiring to go abroad will do so, a trend that cannot and should not be discouraged. In the long run, Indians abroad create brand equity in those countries that they enter and succeed in. Some form of reverse brain drain will eventually occur as we are witnessing today in the IT sector.

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