Political thinking has become an unattractive career choice in free India

livemint.com:

Lamenting on how the “river of ideas that nourished politics has dried up" in independent India, Yogendra Yadav draws attention to “the atrophy of the political imagination...that afflicts the entire political class, cutting across ideological and political boundaries." In his recent column in the Indian Express, the analyst-cum-activist asks, “Where are our political thinkers?" Well, quite a number of our most talented and ambitious young people are responding to economic incentives and pursuing careers in industry, technology and business. Our education system smothers thinking of any kind and our political discourse has long been hostile to free thinking. It comes as no surprise to me that a free, independent India produces fewer political thinkers than Olympic medallists.

Since the late-1970s, India’s brightest have opted for careers in the private sector or government service. Careers in the humanities are still not as remunerative as in technology or business, case closed. Worse, outstanding students of politics can neither enter the civil service nor electoral politics—the field just does not attract good talent.

For a young person, studying engineering opens the doors to careers in industry, bureaucracy and politics more than political science does. Several years ago, while I was helping a leading college design a master’s programme in public policy, I proposed that classes should be held as interactions among the faculty and students. I was shocked that the management was shocked by this because they had been told by the University Grants Commission (UGC) that subjects like history and politics were sensitive, and hence a narrative method should be adopted.