Heh.
Joanna
At 19:31 02-08-01 -0400, you wrote:
><http://www.malaysiakini.com/Foreign/2001/08/2001080102.php3>
>
>Malaysiakini (Kuala Lumpur) - August 1, 2001
>
>India's software young bloods no longer such a good catch
>Jay Shankar
>
>11:56am, Wed: BANGALORE Aug 1 (AFP) - Software engineer B Prakyath has
>trawled through an exhaustive list of 110 prospective brides in the past
>10 months, but the sound of wedding bells remain as distant as ever.
>
>The 25-year-old software developer with HCL Perot Systems in India's IT
>capital, Bangalore, is just one of thousands of young male software
>engineer who have seen their standing in India's job-conscious marriage
>market nosedive in recent months.
>
>Considered a prime catch just one year ago, software professionals are now
>strictly second division material, behind perennial stand-bys like
>chartered accountants.
>
>"It is a depressing scenario," said Prakyath, who finally approached a
>marriage bureau to help him select a bride.
>
>"For the last three or four months I have seen the majority of parents
>hesitating to marry off their daughters to a software engineer as they are
>not sure whether we will have our jobs next year," he said.
>
>Search continues
>
>"But I am not giving up hope and am still continuing the search."
>
>A global slowdown has forced technology companies in the United States and
>India to lay-off staff and freeze recruitment.
>
>Many Indian software engineers who earned 70,000 rupees (US$1,520) a month
>in the US have returned home, futher saturating the domestic IT job market.
>
>"People are gradually losing their confidence in the IT sector," said TG
>Shivraj, chief of Computer Audio-Visual Aided Matrimonial Bureau, which
>has more than 500 IT professionals on its books.
>
>"The parents of the bride are worried. They think there is no future in IT
>now. So they are delaying their proposals," said Shivraj, who opened his
>bureau 11 years ago and clocks an annual turnover of 10 million rupees.
>
>"Previously the IT sector was hot, now brides are shifting to management
>guys, chartered accountants and company secretaries. Indian brides look at
>the status of the person, secure jobs, property and the boy's family" he said.
>
>Good-looking girl
>
>J Rajshekar, a 26-year-old software developer with a well-known car firm
>in Bangalore enrolled with Shivraj's bureau five months ago and initially
>got 150 matches from the firm's computer.
>
>"My aim was to look for a graduate and good-looking girl with a decent
>family background. So I pruned the list to 30 prospective brides. But I
>found that none were willing because I was a software engineer," Rajshekar
>said.
>
>He said his friends who had lost their jobs were stranded with debts, and
>many were not even able to pay back their car loans.
>
>"They are out in the streets. I still have a job even though it will not
>take me to the US or pays me a huge salary. But the brides and parents are
>skeptical about IT now," Rajshekar said.
>
>HCL Perot's Prakyath said the return of software engineers from overseas
>had had a major impact, as one of the main incentives for marriage was the
>opportunity to live abroad, especially in the United States.
>
>"Out of 100 software engineers me and my friends knew about, 85 are back
>in India, many of them with horror stories about the way they were
>treated," Prakyath said.
>
>"I think the worst impact is being felt by the fresh engineering graduates.
>
>They have spent heavily on their education in private engineering
>colleges, only to face a situation where there are no jobs.
>
>"Now brides refusing to marry software engineers will only add to their
>troubles," he said.
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