By: Harshad Oak
In my last piece I wrote about my time in San Francisco. After a hectic work week at San Francisco, me, my wife and a friend headed to Las Vegas. Las Vegas is casino country. You step out of the aircraft at Las Vegas airport and it becomes obvious that Vegas is not just another American city. The first thing you encounter at the airport isn’t baggage claim or immigration or customs, but a series of slot machines!
I am writing this column from the Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco on an Internet connection that’s as fast as the Internet speed of half of Pune put together. It’s strange how fast Internet connections always put me in a good mood. Anyway, talking of OpenWorld, it’s an annual event that has over 40,000 people coming to San Francisco from over a 100 countries. It’s amazing that the city can pull off such a mammoth event fairly easily and the infrastructure doesn’t collapse under the load.
The city administration seems to go the extra mile to ensure that delegates have an enjoyable and safe visit to the city. Although OpenWorld is the biggest, it is just one of the many events that happen all year round at the Moscone Center. Each event not only gets people to San Francisco and works as a great public relations exercise for the city but also pumps millions of dollars into the economy of San Francisco.
A few days back, a friend told me about his plans to head for a foreign country because he has had enough of India. He isn’t one of the ‘crazy about US’ kinds who think that all things American are cool or who only talks about English music and Hollywood. He is as connected to India as most of us. Yet he is convinced that he has to move out of India.
That discussion has got me thinking about the topic of young Indians migrating from India. This article is my attempt to put down the various factors that are at work in this matter.
I will discuss the history of Indian migrations and then look at why people migrate and why they don’t. If you are expecting a yes or no answer about migrating, I unfortunately can’t provide that.
Although I am taking an Indian perspective, I think most points would be relevant to all developing nations.
Also please note that I am trying to take an objective view on the subject and not a patriotic or emotional one.
