IITians, Doctors and the Brain Drain but What if....

Though an old topic, but was thinking about this from some time and so decided to write about it. Should people who get highly subsidized education be allowed to migrate to developed countries? The legal answer is whatever - freedom it is !! Somebody might argue about the moral responsibility then the detabte will become too vague and subjective because ward officer is morally responsible to develop his/her ward, government doctor to provide equal quality of service to everyone visiting government hospitals and I can give 500 more examples in next 5 minutes !! So, lets not get into that...

What does this nation expect from an 22 years old fresh graduate, who has worked hard, prepared under tremendous peer pressure/ family pressure? Society/ family - creates tremendous pressure to get into IIT, followed by pressure to get good grades, followed by pressure to get good job and do well in life( some might argue who's forcing any bdoy to do well by the way? but that might be a topic for another blog entry someday).No wonder Pink Floyd is so popular within IITs...

So what about few hundred thousand Rs. of subsidy given by government of India to students at IIT/IIMs. I hope people are aware that until few years (and to large extent even now), government medical colleges charge fee as low as Rs.500 per semester. What about the 1/3rd rates at which politicians buys cars and computers for personal use and what about the 200% price at which government offices buys printers and same cars for public/office use. Do we have a plan to recover all this money lost in providing subsidies !!

One of my good friend once said that by paying income tax, we are promoting corruption!! Agree yes, but perhaps not a very positive thing to say about one's country. Some might argue that just because person X is doing wrong, we can justify the wrong actions of person Y. I dont agree. What happens when person Y do something good/positive, does it morally binds the person X do good? Not until we have more of X's and less of Y's

I strongly believe that good people are necessary for slow undercurrent kind of revolutions to happen. History though does not appreciate the average good people who do their jobs with honesty, pay taxes on time, help their neighbors, like good music, send their kids to good schools,loves to go out on weekends and don't throw garbage on street.

But what if we can create circumstances for reverse brain drain overnight. What if amongst 25 million Indians living abroad, 10% of most experienced, qualified doctors, lawyers, engineers, writers, poets, businessmen, social activists decide to go back return back to India tomorrow . Imagine 2,500,000 such good, qualified folks being sent back to India overnight. Increase the y's...fill the ecosystem with lot many good people in different walks of life. The number is small but lets take one step more. Lets distribute these folks evenly in 626 districts of India, implying approximate 4000 such folks in each district. Wow, what an addition now, aint it !! What's best about them returning back to India ! Their perspective, their diverse experiences, their ability to see things differently from a purely Indian perspective, their ability to follow rules and make others follow rules. So while we love, secretly hate, feel jealous of other cultures, there are lot many things besides 'widespread acceptance to premarital sex' in other countries and cultures as well, form which we can certainly learn a lot.

I have lived in pretty small towns(can be qualified as village as well)and if I imagine my town filled with 80-100 such folks, whoaa. If there were couple of good guys playing good guitar, running some good small, local companies, running schools and colleges with honesty and integrity, I might not have stepped out of my town. May be I might not be writing this blog then, may be, may be not.

I know of couple of not so positive elements in my town, who influenced 100 odd kids from my school and indulged them into not so socially acceptable practices. So I am sure 4000 such good reverse drained folks can influence millions of students,kids, parents, teachers, musicians and can tremendously add to the undercurrent which over a period of couple of decades can have humongous positive impact on the society. Utopia thoughts!!

Year 2111, A Brith/American writing similar article!! Dont believe me? Read on- Chaos the Only Order !!