Still in undergraduate studies at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Bombay, the 22-year-old has already been recruited by Google.

Like Parag Agarwal, she is one of the thousands of graduates from the Institute's network who are swelling the ranks of major American technology companies.

“When I found out about Parag, it made me so happy,” she recalls.

"my step"

"Google CEO Sundar Pichai is another from IIT," she adds, "he's now my stepping stone. I dream (...) of landing a high post there."

At only 37 years old, Parag Agarwal is the youngest managing director of the S&P 500 Index.

Like Sundar Pichai, 49, CEO of Alphabet, Google's parent company, he left India after graduating from IIT to pursue graduate studies in the United States before working at several American companies. .

Students attend a course at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Bombay, December 6, 2021 Sujit JAISWAL AFP

Among the other Indians who hold the most senior positions in tech, Arvind Krishna of IBM and Nikesh Arora of Palo Alto Networks, both alumni of IIT, as well as Satya Nadella of Microsoft and Shantanu Narayen of Adobe.

According to specialists, this can be explained by multiple factors, including a culture of problem-solving, know-how, fluency in the English language and hard work.

Vinod Khosla, graduate of IIT and co-founder of Sun Microsystems, believes that having grown up in contact with multiple communities, customs and languages, Indians know how to "navigate complex situations".

"competition in the system"

"The competition in the education system in India and societal chaos are helping to sharpen their skills in addition to rigorous technical education provided by IITs," the billionaire venture capitalist told AFP.

Silicon Valley requires technical expertise, leadership in diverse communities and an entrepreneurial spirit from its senior executives in an uncertain environment.

Students attend a course at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Bombay, December 6, 2021 Sujit JAISWAL AFP

"In innovation, you have to dare to break the rules, you have to be daring," said Vivek Wadhwa, an Indo-American scholar and writer.

"You do not survive a single day in India without having to break a rule, without being confronted with an incompetent bureaucracy, with corruption," he continues.

"Such skills are very useful for innovating in Silicon Valley, because authority is constantly being challenged there," adds the author.

"The best"

The competition starts early in a country of over 1.3 billion people with a long-standing emphasis on education.

IITs are considered to be the best universities in India, with over one million students applying for just 16,000 places each year.

For a year and a half, Shivani Nandgaonkar studied for up to 14 hours a day, seven days a week.

The entrance to the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Bombay, December 6, 2021 Sujit JAISWAL AFP

Some prepare from the age of 14 or 15, she emphasizes.

"Imagine admission 10 times harder than at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Harvard. This is what IITs are," says Wadhwa, "be the cream of the crop."

The IIT Network was established in 1950 by Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to provide the country with highly qualified science and engineering graduates after independence from the British in 1947.

Gray matter, N ° 1 in export?

But domestic demand became insufficient, graduates ended up looking abroad, in particular to the United States where the digital revolution was taking off.

This was not the case for Chinese engineers who, after graduating in the United States, had no difficulty finding a job in their country where the economy was booming, recalls Devesh Kapur, professor at the Johns Hopkins University, himself a graduate of IIT.

"In the 60s, 70s and 80s, and even in the 90s, the development of Indian industry was not yet advanced and (...) many who aspired to work in high technology had want to go abroad ", explains S. Sudarshan, deputy director of IIT Bombay.

For years, more than half of skilled immigrant visa applicants to the United States have come from India, mostly from the tech industry.

Engineers such as Agrawal, Pichai and Nadella have spent a good ten years climbing to the top of their respective companies, enriching themselves with the internal culture while gaining the confidence of the founders of these companies.

A student leaves the premises of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Bombay, December 6, 2021 Sujit JAISWAL AFP

So even if India prospers and opportunities flourish in greater number for the brains of the country, Shivani Nandgaonkar, she intends to conquer the top of the world: "We must dream big!"

© 2021 AFP