Millions in doldrums! The sad tale of Indian middleclass at 40 – exploitation and prosperity! 
Preeti Sanghvi, Special Correspondent
October 06, 2004

My name is Surya. I come from a middleclass family in Western India. My father was a schoolteacher and my mother was a housewife. I was brought up with traditional Indian values. I was told to respect others, elderly people and never exploit others. I do have connection to corporate world. I believed in earning my way through sincerity and hard work. I was a good student. I went into IIT Bombay and then Indian Institute of Management. When I was 22, I was offered a fantastic job at an Indian multinational company. Later I found the company was Desi and an Indian Industrialist group bought it. I gave all of my youthful vigor without asking about my future. Slowly I found the world is so crooked. I did not get promoted based on my performance. The most important was who you know and who likes you than what is your real performance. I was pushed into sales. I found Marketing Directors job is not really easy. I could nopt sleep at night thinking about the quota I had to reach. Slowly I was forced into a corner. True Management positions were reserved for Brother-in-laws and Son-in-laws of the “Elite” who controls India. I left my job and went back to my old father. He gave me whatever he had saved all these years and helped me to start a business. NI started a business to show the world what I can really do! Initially things went well. But I had little experience about building and maintaining reserves for rainy day. The rainy and shiny days started alternating. Sometimes I had plenty and felt rich and prosperous and sometimes I was helplessly in debt. The banks were making money on me through the hefty interest they charged. The landlord made money on the rent I was struggling to pay for my business. I hardly could see my ten-year-old daughter and my patient wife as I was working eighteen hours a day. Eventually everything fell apart when the banks decided to sell my business and all my corporate assets. I was sad but did not know what to do. I looked around and decided to go into academics like my father. It is not easy to get any jobs at forty or more. I did not know what to do. My daughter is too young and I am too ambitious to become a hermit!

I looked at some of my friends who went to America. Their tales are even worse. Sujit worked in AT&T for twenty years and is an American citizen. He is today jobless getting retrained with Government’s help in medical Xray technician’s work. An electronics engineer who was a top technologist in Indian Space Research Organization cannot get a job in America. Shattered dream is what haunts many Indian Americans today. They are all in forties and have been sidelined by the society because the company they worked for all their lives could not take the “new world order”. Today Sujit thinks about useless life that had a lot of meaning when he came at the top of national talent search. 

Are these age discriminations? No – these are example of classism just like cast system once caused ruin in India. The new classism is in America, in India and in everywhere.
People are promised of excellent jobs in their twenties, exploited for next fifteen years and then thrown into garbage bin by the companies. The phenomenon in India is more like “I need you when you are young!” In America the phenomenon is different – the companies just cannot survive and so the immigrants in forties are axed first.

Sometime Sujit and me chat quite a bit on the Internet. Sometimes we think of ending our lives. But we were not brought up like that – those things are not in our dictionary. We say to ourselves – we will have to continue – the struggle goes on. We look at the today’s middle class youth who are dancing in Bangalore, Mumbai and Hyderabad making some money for their BPO companies. We wonder what is stored for these kids when they will become forty years old! The industrialists make their money trading these kids like Cabbage in the market. American companies buy their youth for cents on the dollar! But the reality is the exploitation on one hand and prosperity for them goes on! 

I learnt something first hand that I tell my daughter who has learnt to live a modest life. Never feel proud in academic achievements – it can be life’s biggest trap! Learn to be selfish and make a kill when you are able. Never trust your employer. Never try to venture into something innovative because you will get killed and no one will be there to help you! Never feel proud in landing up to a fantastic job when you are in twenties – think what will happen to you when you are in forties. Your vigor and strength when you are in your twenties is your asset. Never sell yourself cheap!