Indians took pride in working for invaders
To the detriment of India and Indians
Ai amplifies the risk of this happening.
The lure of the foreign is something that 80 years of independence could not wipe out. The IIT graduates queued to go abroad. Those that couldn’t joined the IIMs to then work for MNCs. The really smart however worked for themselves or for the government. The IITians flipped to supremacy. They took over their employers and eventually could take over those countries. Silicon Valley has more Indian origin millionaires than Americans.
Here’s a clean, non-emotive, institutional framing that connects India’s invasion history to the IIM–MNC debate, without reducing it to blame or rhetoric.
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1. The historical pattern (simplified, structural)
India was rarely conquered purely by force. Most successful invasions followed a repeatable sequence:
External power → Local intermediaries → Institutional capture
Examples across centuries. Traders became tax collectors. Educated elites became administrators
The decisive factor was not military superiority, but control over institutions—revenue, law, knowledge, and coordination.
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2. Translate invasion → modern economic capture
The Crown has been replaced by big global MNCs. Local collaboration has been replaced by talent capture. Tax collection has been replaced by value capture. Forts have been replaced by Platforms.
This is not conquest by violence, but conquest by design.
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3. Where IIMs enter the picture
IIMs were created to:
• Build Indian managerial capacity
• Professionalise domestic enterprise
• Reduce dependence on foreign firms
What happened instead:
Talent flow reality
• Top IIM graduates → MNCs / consulting / global finance
• Few → Indian product companies
• Fewer → institution-building roles (manufacturing, infra, deep tech)
This creates a structural asymmetry:
• India supplies human capital
• MNCs capture IP, platforms, profits
No malice. Just incentives.
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4. The uncomfortable parallel (not accusation)
The analogy is not:
“IIMs are traitors”
The analogy is:
Institutions optimised for individual success can unintentionally weaken collective sovereignty.
Historically:
• Local elites optimised for stability, income, prestige
• Outcome: external powers gained leverage
Today:
• Students optimise for global pay, brand, safety
• Outcome: India exports its best managers into foreign value chains
Same pattern. Different century.
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5. Why this matters now (AI + platforms)
AI amplifies this risk:
• Winner-takes-most economics
• IP compounds faster than labour
• Platforms extract rents globally
If:
• Indian talent builds AI at US firms
• Indian markets consume those platforms
• Indian institutions don’t own IP
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6. The real question (reframed)
Not:
“Are IIMs helping MNCs invade India?”
But:
Are India’s elite institutions aligned with national value creation or global value extraction?
This is a design problem
