India is perhaps the only country in the world where parents decide the career of their children a few moments after birth.
This has famously been captured in the classic Bollywood movie 3-Idiots where the character of Farhan Qureshi played by R.Madhavan says "I was born at 5:15 am and at 5:16 am my father said: My son will be an engineer ".
The film which stars Aamir Khan (one of the most intellgent and biggest bollywood superstars) is an excellent depiction of what engineering education is like in India and how parents force their kids to pursue careers that are only meant to create a good standing in society for...
This has famously been captured in the classic Bollywood movie 3-Idiots where the character of Farhan Qureshi played by R.Madhavan says "I was born at 5:15 am and at 5:16 am my father said: My son will be an engineer ".
The film which stars Aamir Khan (one of the most intellgent and biggest bollywood superstars) is an excellent depiction of what engineering education is like in India and how parents force their kids to pursue careers that are only meant to create a good standing in society for...
emselves (instead of pursuing what they love) . The movie was such an outrageous success that it is one of the highest grossing bollywood films of all time and is a treat to watch over and over again.
No wonder, because India produces 600,000 engineers from colleges across the country every year (read here for more) and in many families it is a trait that has been passed on for generations. It is not uncommon to see three to four generations of one family ranging from immediate brothers, cousins, uncles and distant relatives all having an engineering background.
Quite boring you might say. Fortunately the girls are spared from this pressure and most of the girls who pursure engineering do so out of their interest (which again works against the guys since engineering schools have a highly skewed sex ratio).
The pressure however doesn't stop at being an Engineer. If you can add an MBA to that you become part of an elusive club (although its becoming too common now). More about this is captured in a story on BusinessBecause (read here).
The reference to this trend is again captured in 3-Idiots where the character of Rancho, (played by Aamir Khan) tells Pia (played by Kareena Kapoor)
"Your boyfriend is an ass. He first did his Engineering and then did an MBA and now works in a bank. If he wanted to work in a bank then why did he choose to become an engineer".
Given this context it actually comes as a nice surprise that the actual shooting for most of 3-Idiots was done at IIM - Bangalore. IIMB as it is more popularly known was showcased as Imperial College of Engineering or ICE in the movie.
Thanks to YouTube you can actually checkout the experience of the 3 Idiots team at IIMB below:
No wonder, because India produces 600,000 engineers from colleges across the country every year (read here for more) and in many families it is a trait that has been passed on for generations. It is not uncommon to see three to four generations of one family ranging from immediate brothers, cousins, uncles and distant relatives all having an engineering background.
Quite boring you might say. Fortunately the girls are spared from this pressure and most of the girls who pursure engineering do so out of their interest (which again works against the guys since engineering schools have a highly skewed sex ratio).
The pressure however doesn't stop at being an Engineer. If you can add an MBA to that you become part of an elusive club (although its becoming too common now). More about this is captured in a story on BusinessBecause (read here).
The reference to this trend is again captured in 3-Idiots where the character of Rancho, (played by Aamir Khan) tells Pia (played by Kareena Kapoor)
"Your boyfriend is an ass. He first did his Engineering and then did an MBA and now works in a bank. If he wanted to work in a bank then why did he choose to become an engineer".
Given this context it actually comes as a nice surprise that the actual shooting for most of 3-Idiots was done at IIM - Bangalore. IIMB as it is more popularly known was showcased as Imperial College of Engineering or ICE in the movie.
Thanks to YouTube you can actually checkout the experience of the 3 Idiots team at IIMB below:
{{video:embed url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aIe08Q2TTU"}}
(The Author is an MBA from AGSM,UNSW,Sydney and Kellogg School Of Management, USA. He is also the Founder & Editor of DelhiPlanet Media You can follow him on Twitter @kirtidhingra)
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