Who Are the Parasites in India? |
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The Cockroach Janta Party is now the voice of the resentment felt by Indian youth not only toward the incompetence, and even corruption, of those in power (which manifests itself in repeated exam leak scandals), but also and above all toward unemployment.
While India has long been a classic example of jobless growth, the situation has worsened since growth began to slow down, and in a manner quite contrary to official figures. This state of affairs is all the more unbearable because the higher students’ educational qualifications, the harder it is for them to find a quality job.
In 2024, a study by the International Labour Organization showed that the unemployment rate among graduates reached 29.1%. This situation is linked to a lack of job opportunities and the mismatch between the expectations of job seekers and those of employers. On the one hand, the decline of the public education sector is driving families to turn to private institutions, where tuition fees are sometimes prohibitive, leading to significant debt that prompts young graduates to demand decent salaries and reject jobs they view as “subpar.” On the other hand, employers say they cannot find the skilled workforce they need, as private universities are no better than public ones at meeting their requirements.
But while the quality of education is in question, so is the quality of the jobs offered to young people.
Shortage of qualified engineers
The case of IT is particularly interesting here because it has long been one of the jewels of the Indian economy. This sector, which already does not employ a very large number of people – in 2017, it accounted for only 5.4 million direct jobs and 15 million indirect jobs – is seeing its workforce barely grow due to automation processes and the advent of Artificial Intelligence. According to an expert report, “Automation and artificial intelligence further threaten 40% of IT jobs” in India.
However, this phenomenon is linked to India’s position in the value chain. Indeed, many employees in the sector hold low-skilled positions: more than 1.4 million of the 5.4 million mentioned above work in business process management or BPM – where they perform tasks that are fairly easy to automate. This phenomenon is not limited to India: in 2022, so-called “tech” companies worldwide laid off nearly 165,000 employees. Major Indian companies in the sector have also begun laying off employees. By 2023, the workforce of the 12 leading Indian companies in the sector had decreased by 4%. In 2023-24, for the first time in its history, Infosys reduced its workforce from 347,234 to 317,240, a decrease of 7.6%. Similarly – and in an equally unprecedented move – Wipro’s workforce fell from 250,000 to 234,000 (-6.5%). Even TCS, the industry leader, saw its workforce shrink for the first time since its founding, from 614,795 to 601,546. Capgemini maintained its workforce in 2024, but had reduced it by 5.3% – from 359,567 to 340,443 – in 2023. Only Accenture continues to hire, with its workforce reaching 774,000 people in 2024. More recently, TCS, which still employs 600,000 people worldwide, announced that in 2025-26, it would further reduce its workforce by 3.5%. The reason given, aside from the impact of AI and the Trump measures cited above, is........