IT or a time to get LIT?

shankar #16: I cannot give you the answer to the joke. All this time, I thought you were from South India. I am not sure where the dividing line is between North, South and Central India, but I assume it cannot be higher than Hyderabad. Which would make you a non-South Indian. In which case, it becomes politically incorrect to make South Indian jokes. So I take back my somewhat racist attempts at describing the faults and virtues of South Indians. I hope I didn`t offend anyone.

Jinnah and Gandhi were both from Gujrat, I believe. Jinnah from Bombay. There is a city named Gujrat in Pakistan, also; not a province. It is between Pindi and Jehlum. There are many Pakistanis who have migrated from Bombay. Their families have been very successful in Pakistan. Memons dominate the business circles in Karachi.

Your comments about Indian Sindhis is interesting. In Pakistan, you will hear exactly the opposite about Pakistani Sindhis. Rural Sind is the most backward part of Pakistan. Completely feudal, with extremely low literacy rates. Unfortunately, it only produces potential Prime Ministers and MNAs. Due to this everyday rural Sindhis, I am afraid, haven`t had chances to move ahead in any field. Added to this is the fact, that they face competition from urban Sindhis. Urban Sindhis (Muhajirs), by a huge margin, are the most educated, progressive and wealthy group in Pakistan. They have also been very successful at the officer level in the beaurecracy and military. So rural Sindhis are completely out of the loop. Due to this, there exists a great deal of animosity between urban Sindhis and rural Sindhis. Two ethnic minorities, one at the top of the ladder, the other at the bottom.

I am assisting a friend with a story on Chowk. Chapter 3 introduces a shipping tycoon from Bombay.

Shakir:

An entrepreneur faces different problems depending upon the part of the world he lives in. And these different parts of the world also provide competitive advantages. Silicon valley has better infrastructure and access to talent and capital but many of the emerging IT economies have cost advantages that are difficult to come by in the developed world.

I agree with your assessment that the government can do jack about ushering in a IT `revolution`. Unlike most I am no fan of the science and technology minister. His micromanagement has already saddled Pakistan with a bunch of white elephants in the form of IT universities and various regulatory bodies. I have a feeling that pretty soon the requirement for running for parliament in Pakistan would not be a mere BA but a BCS(Bachelor of computer science)!! Even some of the peons in the government departments proudly display this qualification..............

India has done relatively better than other countries in the IT sphere because unlike Pakistan and others it has indigenous uses for IT resources developed within the country. It has also coped well with the brain drain that has afflicted the industry. In Pakistan the best and brightest have left not only the engineering but also the beauracratic and junior military cadres. Its the brave few like you that have ventured back. Pakistani software houses are on a decline unmatched across the border. Cressoft once the premier software house has pretty much gone under. Same thing with Netsol. It went from 4 floors in a swanky building to just one in a matter of weeks. But then these are trying times.

Shankar:

Sikhs and Sindhis are the two groups amongst Indians guaranteed to have a good time with. The rest are too busy counting their pennies :)

The ambitious immigrant needs communities because unlike the high-flying natives he or she cannot draw upon networks from prep schools and colleges.

later

-sac

Re Romair

The General of Generalizations goes off again.

``The ideal South Asian CEO would have a South Indian mind, a Sikh sense of humor, Afghani looks and Pakistani leadership skills (haven`t met enough Indians in IT from other parts of India to form any opinion about them yet).``

What Pakistani leadership skills, sir, are you inferring? Rather than get into the usual body count of leadership, I am going to refute both. Leadership is not a regional or ethnic thing. It is personal and individual-oriented. Just because you haven`t met in your travail a single southie with the charisma doesn`t mean they all are alike. OK, there is one dynamic CEO who`s paki, but he`s not in IT and you guys will ignore him--Fred Hassan of Pharmacia. Other than that, it`s a mixed bag, right? and what are the leaders of Mckinsey, United, or the Hartford companies. Chopped liver or Indians?

``Why shouldn`t South Indians play sports?``

Another gross generalization. Rather, the question is why don`t most subcontinentals play sports? The answer is poverty and the need to find a job. Sports is a luxury in most cases. But here are a few counterpoints:

Tennis: Amritraj brothers, Bhupathi. Weightlifting: Malleswari, the only person from the blasted subcontinent who won a goddam medal in the last olympics.

Cricket: at least a third of the current Indian team

Track and Field: the whole subcontinent stinks here

Archery and shooting: Oh no, not the Ak-47 shoot people up type, but the sport versions: the whole subcontinent stinks

Re: Shankar

``...After a few years, she refused to go to any of their functions. So, by & large, we socialise primarily with Americans...``

Capitulating to your better half is one of the cardinal rules for happiness in life.

``...Sindhis & Gujjus have colonised the whole world & made millions...``

I have run into Sindhi/Gujju traders in East Africa (where they practically run the economy), and in (of all places) US Virgin Islands. I was stunned to see the entire market for duty free shopping for passenger cruiseliners taken over by Sindhis. One Sindhi businessman told me how he had relocated from Karachi, Bombay, Nigeria to US VI (all in a lifetime)! It was amazing. The crew for cruiseliners were also mostly S. Asian.

Do you really know where the thugs & terrorists are?--Are you sure you are not under a Satanic spell?---Are you really putting your use of english to free your colonised minds,or--?Is your soul really yours,or--?---when was the last time you checked?

______________________________________________

Coca-Karma: The Very Secret Battle of Bob Kolody vs. Coca-Cola (KO)

Prologue: April 18, 2001

When the shareholders of Coca-Cola filed into the Playhouse Theatre in Wilmington, Delaware on the morning of April 18 for their annual meeting, you can bet that the last name they had on their minds was that of Bob Kolody. What with the recent resignation of President and COO Jack Stahl, Chairman Doug Daft’s failed attempt to buy Quaker Oats, and the Atlanta court ruling that awarded close to $200 million dollars in damages to Johnny Cochran’s racial discrimination suit, they had enough names to worry about. Not to mention the fact that their stock was selling for $45, thirty percent off the 52 week high of $64. Right about where it was 5 years ago.

But if some of those shareholders had known the story that you are about to read, they would have had good reason to question Coca-Cola Chairman Doug Daft about Bob Kolody. They would have been fascinated to know that for the past four years Coke has employed one of the country’s top intellectual property lawyers to defend a case that it has never identified in its annual SEC filings. What’s more, the $4 billion lawsuit has gone totally unreported by a national media that has, of late, reveled in the prospect of major U.S. corporations involved in trials that could cost hundreds of millions of dollars in damages.

Over the next ten installments of an exclusive Special Report, GNN breaks wide open one of the most intriguing cases in corporate legal history. The story begins with a major advertising agency stealing an independent consultant`s story-boards and culminates with allegations that Coke filed fraudulent copyright applications and enacted a high-level form of espionage against their legal opponent. What`s more, the federal judge in the case has been accused of having links to organized crime. Tantalizing? You bet. And we’re only getting started…

Coca-Karma: The Very Secret Battle of Bob Kolody vs. Coca-Cola

Introduction: Short Synopsis

Part One: Classic Coke, Classic Cars

Part Two: The Plot Thickens

Part Three: David and Goliath

Part Four: Alice in Wonderland

Part Five: The Beginning of the End

Part Six: Enter Skolnick...

Part Seven: The Bravest Lawyer (I)

Part Eight: The Bravest Lawyer (II)

Part Nine: Battle Scars

Part Ten: Final Jeopardy

Epilogue: The Fire This Time

Updates

Breaking News: August 2, 2001

Update: December 22, 2001

Send this Page | About GNN | Subscribe

FOR COMPLETE ACCESS:www.guerillanews.com/cocakarma

Romair #12 you write ``South Indian mind, a Sikh sense of humor, Afghani looks and Pakistani leadership skills ``

I assume you mean:

- a South Indian mind: like that of Jay Thakeray;

- a Sikh sense of humor: like that of the Vancouver Sikhs who blew up an Air-India flight a few years ago;

- Afghani looks: like that of Mullah Omar; and

- Pakistani leadership skills: like that of Nawaz Sharif, Benazir, Zia, ``Taegoor`` Niazi...

=== Interact Filtered ===
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=== Interact Filtered ===
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Romair,

Being a South Indian, I enjoyed your complimentary remarks, though I think it is too much of a generalisation. Still, among the top Indian IT companies, Wipro, Infosys, Satyam are all South based and run by South Indians (most of Premji`s staff is South Indian even though he is not), so maybe you have hit upon something ;-)

Romair,

{{Why shouldn`t South Indians play sports?}}

umm...lemme guess...their brains use up most of the calories, so none remain for the body. But I`m sure you got a funnier answer.

BTW, have you dealt with any Bombayites? Bombay is the most Westernised city in India. In my experience, Bombayites adapt to the US culture better than most Indians. Ahem..we have the best qualities of both, the North & South. In a sense, we are just like NYorkers--we curse Bombay constantly, but just cannot live in any other part of India, other than Bombay:)

90% of the Indian docs in my town are from the South. Very intelligent, with highly successful practices. They`ve even begun to buy out American doc`s practices! Amazing, cos they cant speak English to save their lives! They will use their entire vacations to go to India--EVERY year!

Their wives, though very sweet, are extremely clannish. They wont socialise with any Americans; primarily because they have an inferiority complex. Their children, who are by now in colleges are usually extremely bright & get into some of the premier Ivy league schools. I`m beginning to see a lot of clashes between the 2 generations.

My wife, also a Bombayite, came to the US in her early teens. She cant STAND going to Indian parties. These ladies will start a conversation with her--& in mid-sentence, revert to their S.Indian language & start babbling amongst themselves. She`s totally ignored & feels like she`s a fly on the wall. After a few years, she refused to go to any of their functions. So, by & large, we socialise primarily with Americans. Most of my classmates are in Chicago--boy, if we want to have a good time with Indians, we fly down to the windy city.

The Indians who have the BEST business acumen, by far, are Sindhis & Gujeratis. Marwaris are superb too, but very few of them go abroad. Sindhis & Gujjus have colonised the whole world & made millions. I have a soft spot for Sindhis, because most of my classmates are Sindhis. Their parents left Pakistan with just the clothes on their backs. In just one generation, their per capita income is probably several times that of an average Indian. Even in the US, my Sindhi classmates started investing their meager Intern`s salary in the stock market. Today they are multi-millionaires many times over--even when the market is down.

Bottom line..if you want a good partner AND want advice in getting a date---try a Bombayite.....esp a Sindhi..but make sure you keep youre hands on youre wallet all the time:))

There are fundementally two problems:

(a)Shakir has identified one - why go outside when you have home grwon talent. There is a need to build up expertise. Without that you can shout from the roof tops and didly happens. People say that govt should be out of the loop. SUre it should, but the real help comes in developing the expertise in the country - and that comes by providing project and hence funds for developing this expertise.

(b) there is a telling article in the frontierport by Yattu and I quote

``We have neither the institutions, nor the teachers, nor the students available, neither in number nor in quality. So what kind of IT professionals would we produce? Competing with India just for the sake of competition is plain absurdity.

Perhaps our policy makers are not aware of the fact that India is one of the few countries outside the West and America that has knowledge-based industries.

The same is true about China.

They need IT for inside much more than outside. ``

Note the last line. Now that is a telling line in the article. It is asociated with point one. You have to develop it in house - generate and create expertise then you will have the exports.

Else it is like putting thecart before the horse.

Reply Romair

Romair, that`s as good an argument for a South Asian confederation as I have ever heard.

Ham thaiyaar hain. We have Chidambaram poised and ready for deployment.

Zafar

PS I will warn you that I will work against appointment of Bangladeshi to deal with culture since I loathe Robindra Shongeet. Apart from that, I can see your CEO`s ``star quality``, you have a free hand as far as I`m concerned.

``Yet as entrepreneurs we are expected to compete with international companies with no electricity, no phone lines, and bad infrastructure. This is exactly like expecting the Taliban to win against the might of the American war machine``

Are you implying that the Taliban should not be expected to win against the American war machine ? Do you have no faith brother ? Have faith brother. Rely on Allah and don`t think so much about business and making money because your reward lies in the hereafter.
The trouble is nobody gives the Taliban time to accomplish anything. Wars take years atleast- give the Taliban some time and they will win the war and turn Afghanistan (and then Pakistan) into 6th century Muslim empire ! golden age of Islam :) Insha allah :)

Shankar #5: I hope ROTFL means Rolling on the Floor Laughing, and not something abusive.

I have learnt my lessons through hard experience. My partner/accountant in my tiny consulting business is a South Indian. I never make any of the major decisions, regardless of how much he asks me to. South Indians have an uncanny ability to filter out the static and logically point out the core of a problem. This is why people cannot figure out how so many South Indians can run companies, when many of them can barely speak two words with confidence. Their talent lies in decision making based on logical analyses.

The reason for this is either their diet, or their genes. My own theory is that they are related to Vulcans. If you look at their ears, they are bit pointier than most. Based on this, my experience has been that Pakistanis and Indians, on average, individually are on the same plane as far as IT is concerned (I don`t think Indians are any better than Pakistanis; although many people think so). However, South Indians are at a different plane from both Pakistanis and non-South Indians.

At the same time, a lot of South Indians don`t seem to have very good execution skills. I once interviewed with the CEO of a small US consulting company run by a South Indian. He spent two hours trying to explain exactly what he was doing. At the end, he was so tongue tied and his speech so confused, that I came out of his office with a headache. Yet every project the guy put his company into was a success. It was amazing. The contract was a few months long. He made all the decisions for the projects, and I did all the talking. It worked out quite well.

Similarly with my partner, he decides which projects we will take, and which ones we will reject. I then go and actually try to get the contract. He decides for both of us which car to buy, and I go talk to the salesman. If it was vice-versa, we would both end up buying the wrong cars and paying a couple of thousands dollars too much for them.

The ideal South Asian CEO would have a South Indian mind, a Sikh sense of humor, Afghani looks and Pakistani leadership skills (haven`t met enough Indians in IT from other parts of India to form any opinion about them yet).

Since you seem to be in a mood for humor, answer the following:

Why shouldn`t South Indians play sports?

One Indian thinks I.T. is one more exclusivity of the priviliged class with land money & therefore education to continued reign on the 80% disenfranchised for whom Gandhi bled!

It`s the old Brahminical instinct. Colonise knowledge, build four walls around it, and use it to your advantage. The Manusmriti, the Vedic Hindu code of conduct, says that if a Dalit overhears a shloka or any part of a sacred text, he must have molten lead poured into his ear. It isn`t a coincidence that while India is poised to take her place at the forefront of the Information Revolution, millions of her citizens are illiterate. (It would be interesting, as an exercise, to find out how many `experts`—scholars, professionals, consultants—in India are actually Brahmins or from the upper castes.)``

Which famous acclaimed award winning Indian said this in the 21St Century ?

With more than 200000 largest influx of Code coolies from India ,there is a dramatic difference in immigrants of 60,70,& 80s who are stable citizen by now & never knew alphabet soup of visas J-H1b- L- Fiance visa what not .But never before 200.000 came in 2-3 years period of time.

The immigration game just changed & rule is EASY COME EASY GOES ...or Last one in First one to Go ...or somthing like that

Posted at 10:20 p.m. PST Saturday, Feb. 2, 2002

Back to India for tech workerRecession steals his

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job and American lifestyle

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BY JENNIFER BJORHUS

Mercury News

MUMBAI, India -- The rice maker, blender and bread maker went to charity.

The dining room table, the television and the leather couch they had carefully picked out together, they sold. Niranjan and Sandhya could not afford to get sentimental.

Still, Sandhya had forbidden her husband the engineer from selling the glass-encased clock her co-workers back in India had given her when she went away. It held the spot of honor on the entertainment center in their Fremont apartment, a piece of home marking the days of their new life.

``I promised her a lot. I said jobs are plentiful,`` the 29-year-old Niranjan says.

Four months after getting a pink slip from his San Jose employer, Niranjan`s big dream of starting his own software company had come to this: a one-way ticket back to India, the day before Christmas.

With tech`s fortunes slumping, laid-off programmers like Niranjan have been streaming back to India. ``The Global Indian`s in Reverse Exodus,`` heralds a New Year`s Day paper in New Delhi. There`s even a Web site to help with the re-entry (www.return2India.com).

No one knows how many of the estimated 250,000 Indians working in the United States on special H-1B visas have headed home since the technology bubble burst and recession set in. H-1B visas allow foreigners to stay in the United States for six years as long as they`re employed by a sponsor company. With no job, it`s either find a new sponsor or leave.

The U.S. government doesn`t track H-1B exits. H.H.L. Viswanathan, India`s consul general in San Francisco, guesses that at least 2,000 H-1B visa workers from the Bay Area have headed home in the past year. Raj Desai, president of the Indus Entrepreneur, figures it`s more like tens of thousands.

The reverse exodus illustrates the undertow of economic globalization -- people caught in the storm, as globalization-watcher William Greider puts it, of an economic revolution that`s rewriting psychological boundaries and norms of business.

The story of Sandhya and Niranjan -- they asked not to be identified further -- is about this storm. It`s a tale of opportunity and bottom-line shakeouts, of excitement and pain, of two homes and the upheaval in between.

It`s also about a fairly new concept for people like Niranjan: no job security like back home.

Uncertainty and fear

Niranjan was highly paid, even by U.S. standards, reflecting globalization`s premium on certain skills. Still, not unlike migrant laborers in orchards and kitchens, this elite group lives with the uncertainty and fear that for many go hand in hand with globalization.

``It puts them right into the same pot as the factory worker in Michigan,`` says Antonia Juhasz at the International Forum on Globalization in San Francisco. ``Companies have protection. The only way workers can protect themselves is if the company has long-term roots in the community, or they have unions and contractual agreements.``

Others focus on what they see as a silver lining in the storm cloud.

``We`re sort of seeing a shift from `brain drain` to `brain circulation,` `` says AnnaLee Saxenian, a professor at the University of California-Berkeley and expert on transnational communities.

To her, Niranjan and Sandhya are part of an accelerating back-and-forth of Chinese and Indian emigres between the United States and their homelands. Such an exchange will benefit both economies in the long run, she argues.

What`s unique about India`s overseas tech workers, Saxenian notes, is that there`s largely two streams. Less-experienced code-writers may have been exploited by so-called body-shoppers who illegally underpay workers or intimidate them, for instance, by holding passports.

The other stream frequently is the cream of India`s best schools. Many quickly became part of the Silicon Valley elite, enjoying material comforts they could only dream of at home, and even beyond the reach of most Americans.

``They`re becoming one of the most powerful groups in the global economy right now in terms of access to capital, ability to travel and political influence,`` Saxenian says.

Beyond stereotypes

Niranjan is proud to be an ``engineer ambassador`` for his homeland, showing people an India beyond the stereotype, as he puts it, ``of snake charmers and roaming elephants.`` Indian culture taught him the concept of ``Vasudhaiv Kutumbakam,`` he says: ``The world is one family.``

The story of Niranjan and Sandhya`s American odyssey began in Bangalore in 1998.

A lush tropical city in southern India with fiery hot cuisine and frequent rain showers, Bangalore is the heart of India`s burgeoning tech industry. India`s Silicon Valley, it`s called.

Niranjan was just 25 then, an adventurous young engineer writing code for a large German company. He earned good money by Indian standards -- about $4,300 a year. The company had even sent him for a year to Germany, where he tasted the wealth outside his poor country.

By 1998, the Y2K and Internet business was heating up. Recruiters were scouring India for engineers. Body-shoppers would cold-call Niranjan at his office, promising interviews in Singapore or the United States.

It was a world Niranjan knew little about. He did not come from a wealthy family -- his mother was a science teacher, his father taught Hindi and art in a quiet town just outside Kolhapur, an industrial city of 700,000 in the tobacco and sugar cane fields of southwestern India.

His most direct exposure to U.S. culture were the hippies who hung out in Kolhapur. He knew the United States as a superpower with impressive scientific achievements. He had heard the success stories of Indians who had gone to the United States and become doctors.

Niranjan ignored the recruiters in Bangalore. But when he saw an ad for a Silicon Valley telecommunications start-up, he went for an interview. The work sounded interesting, the pay princely: $57,000 a year.

Four months later, with his H-1B visa, Niranjan was off to America. Everyone, it seemed, was leaving.

``It was really a mass exodus,`` he recalls. ``We were having parties and everything. Everybody was happy.``

May 9, 1998. It was raining when Niranjan stepped off the plane in San Francisco.

Everyone can afford cars, he remembers thinking. He was surprised to see so many Indians.

Niranjan dove into his new life with gusto. He went to work for a Newark start-up writing code to route telephone calls. He loved flying down the freeway in the new Volkswagen Passat he bought -- his first car. He also took up a different kind of flying -- paragliding. On weekends, he soared like a bird over the hills off Highway 1.

Work was good at first. His green card, which would allow him to stay in the United States without a company sponsor, was being processed. Still, much of the job was routine maintenance -- not what he had expected. ``Donkey work,`` he called it.

Lucrative offer

In December 2000, a San Jose optical-networking start-up offered him more creative work at a far bigger salary, with stock options. Niranjan grabbed it, even though the job-hopping would set him back in getting his green card. The work meant that much to him, he says.

It was a classic valley tale -- right down to the job-hopping.

But for all his embrace of ultra-modernity, Niranjan has one foot planted squarely in tradition. Back home, his parents were arranging his marriage.

A month after switching jobs, Niranjan flew back to India to meet a young woman he had never before seen. Grabbing his childhood friend Umesh for moral support, he and the family trooped over to her house for tea. There was Sandhya, a pretty young woman with thick cropped hair in a pink sari, her father, who helped manage a mining company, and her mother.

Niranjan was nervous -- but he immediately liked Sandhya`s independence and intelligence. She had a degree in computer science and did programming for a firm in Kolhapur. He didn`t want a traditional homemaker.

``She also thinks the modern way,`` Niranjan says.

Two days later he asked Sandhya to dinner -- and to marry him. They walked home that night, holding hands for the first time.

Six months later they married. After a quick honeymoon in Switzerland, they flew to California and moved into their new Fremont apartment to live out their dream.

A self-described tomboy, Sandhya loved the California outdoors. The couple filled weekends with ski trips, hiking and ice skating. They loaded up on stuff from the mall.

Still, Sandhya was homesick. She put statues of Ganesh, the elephant-headed Hindu god of wisdom and good fortune, around the apartment. The glass clock was a prominent reminder of home.

Because Niranjan didn`t yet have a green card, the law said Sandhya couldn`t get a job. So, with Niranjan`s long hours, she found herself alone much of time.

Then, last August, it happened: Niranjan`s company was struggling. After buying another firm the company was over-staffed. It cut about 100 software developers.

Niranjan remembers how his group forced smiles as they trooped into a room to collect their termination letters. He called Sandhya. Don`t worry, she said, you`ll get another job.

But without another company to sponsor him, Niranjan wasn`t even sure he was in the country legally. He was scared. He kept trying to find work, but doors closed, he said, when the issue of his visa came up. A lawyer told him he could stay a maximum of six months without another sponsor. Particularly frustrating, he said, was seeing his old co-workers at his first job get their green cards.

Niranjan was angry. Not at Silicon Valley or his company`s managers, but at the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service for what he saw as the indiscriminate system of distributing green cards. Many employers won`t hire people on H-1B visas, for legal and political reasons.

``It`s like we`re migrant labor,`` Niranjan says. ``I really feel very bad. It`s not my decision to go back. It`s something that was forced on me. I have contributed so much to the economy and everything.``

Layoffs may be routine in the United States but they`re a new phenomenon in India with its quasi-socialist history. Companies historically retain employees even in tough times. There are no pink-slip parties.

``People hide here,`` said one 31-year-old engineer in Hyderabad who quit his job in Phoenix before what seemed like an inevitable layoff. ``It`s a prestige issue.``

The United States is the ultimate destination of any self-respecting software engineer, says R. Murugesh, chief executive officer of Assure Consulting Services, a recruiting firm in Bangalore. For many people, the U.S. job was a source of tremendous pride not just for the engineer but for the whole family.

``Everybody looks at the family with new awe and respect,`` says Shikha Bhatia, Assure`s associate editor.

She estimates Assure gets as many as four inquiries a day from people who have lost their jobs in the United States but who keep going to work without getting paid. Returning to India is a last resort.

``It`s seen as some kind of failure in a brave new world,`` Bhatia says. Adding insult to injury, computer engineers are even commanding less on India`s marriage market these days.

But in a sign that ``brain circulation`` isn`t just a catchphrase, Niranjan landed a job outside Mumbai (formerly known as Bombay) even before he and Sandhya moved back. He`s at a start-up -- he asked not to name it -- run by an Indo-American in Silicon Valley.

At $24,000, his annual pay in Mumbai is a fraction of what he was earning in California. Given the difference in cost of living, however, it puts them squarely in India`s upper-middle class.

The new year has Sandhya busy furnishing the two-bedroom apartment they found in a good neighborhood. High in a tower with a view of the hills and the rising sun, the apartment has polished white granite floors.

Tech doing OK

Despite the flood of returning engineers, those with solid experience at U.S. companies will find jobs, recruiters say. India`s young tech industry has largely weathered the recession better than expected.

With exports and foreign investment still a tiny part of its income, India is insulated from some of globalization`s storm this time. It may be able to dodge the global recession altogether, some economists say.

Kiran Karnik, president of Nasscom, India`s top technology association, describes his nation`s tech downturn as a ``speed breaker.``

For Niranjan, Sandhya and many others, it means starting over.

It`s not easy.

They had never planned on living in such a huge city. Mumbai`s filthy air gives Sandhya fevers. The tremendous crowds and traffic mean no quick weekend getaways like the ones they relished in California. Struggling to explain what was so special about the United States, Sandhya says it let free her adventurous spirit. And she misses their Fremont apartment near Lake Elizabeth, where they would stroll in the evening.

Niranjan is holding fast to the dream of his own software company. Resolute, he insists their story will have the happy ending they want.

When it came down to the wire in December, he didn`t sell everything. He put the computer, the VCR and the Passat into storage in San Jose.

There it all sits, waiting, along with Sandhya`s glass clock, marking the time until the couple returns to claim it.

``I`m going to come back,`` Niranjan says. ``See you in the Bay Area.``











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