Yesterday, I went to a well known synthetic fibres plant on the outskirts of Mumbai. This plant, owned by a premier Indian business group, had seen its haydays in the 80s. But now, with expansion planned elsewhere in India (Uttaranchal, Rajasthan etc), there's a recruitment freeze. New workers are taken on a paltry sum on contract basis, and made permanent after 5 yrs. No wonder then, that even a low paid worker wishes his children to do anything but follow in his foot steps.
Of course, people are still dying for work, and the 'no one' whom I refer to would be the English educated(not necessarily English speaking!), cosmopolitan metro living generation. A B.Sc prefers to work at Wipro rather than be a chemist at a factory. The pay differences are stark, but what is even more compelling is the sheer 'shame' of confessing to your friends that you work in a factory.
A friend of mine got placed at Asian Paints straight out of IIT JEE, and was desperately hoping for a change. Residing on the outskirts of Mumbai, he had little enthusiasm in telling all and sundry that he would be working at Bhandup/Ambernath. While his story had an happy ending(he got into one of India's best Bschools), this is not true for everyone.
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