Japan, Southeast countries becoming preferred job destinations for Indians

Usually, for most Indian Students from prestigious institutions such as the IITs (Indian Institutes of Technology) and IIMs (Indian Institutes of Management), the United States, and the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and so on, were the places they would look to join jobs in after their graduation.

That seems to be changing. Sapna Agarwal, IIM Bangalore’s career development services head, was quoted by the Live Mint as saying that there has been a significant tilt towards countries such as Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, the other Southeast Asian nations and the Middle East, lately.

It is being attributed to the changing immigration policies adopted by few Western nations and the not so buoyant economic climate prevailing there.

Rohin Kapoor, a director with Deloitte, said that a dynamic work environment, shortage of skilled workers, attractive job openings, nearness to India and more liberal immigration policies are attracting job seekers there. He said that most of these nations are now pitching themselves to Indian students by organising road shows to showcase job opportunities in their respective countries.

Of the 15 job offers made at IIT Madras in 2016, three were from Japan and one each from Singapore and Taiwan. Even IIT Kharagpur witnessed two job offers being made from Malaysia, three from Japan and one apiece from Taiwan and Singapore. Both the Malaysian employers were said to be first-time recruiters.

Debasis Deb, career development centre chairman, IIT Kharagpur said that they were noticing more job opportunities from countries such as Japan and Taiwan. While IIT graduates were being recruited by Singapore-based architecture companies, Japanese were hiring mostly electronic graduates.

On the other hand, it is reported that graduates in finance were being picked up by Far East nations, the Middle East countries were recruiting management graduates for marketing jobs.

Abbasali Gabula, deputy director with SPJIMR (S.P. Jain Institute of Management and Research), said that though the US still continues to fascinate Indian students, the cost of living in America is very high. Besides, it is becoming tougher to procure a US work visa when compared to countries such as Dubai, Taiwan, Malaysia and other countries.

According to headhunting experts, offers from Southeast Asia and the Middle East will only continue to rise in the next few years.

If you are looking to travel to any one of the aforementioned countries to be employed there, contact Y-Axis, one of the most prominent overseas job consultancy firms in the world, at one of its several global offices.