It's better not to attend university in India: Saurabh Mukherjea on why it makes no sense to study after school

A college degree in India may be worth less than a JCB licence. That is the blunt verdict from Saurabh Mukherjea, Founder and CIO of Marcellus Investment Managers, who in a podcast, argued that students who stop studying after Class 12 are often better off financially than those who go on to graduate. He is not the only one making statement about degree problem in India. Recently, India's Chief Economic Adviser, V Anantha Nageswaran, also made a strikingly similar point on a separate platform, telling young Indians to look past degrees and competitive exams and pick up trade skills instead.

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The 'Ratta Maaro' Problem

Mukherjea said that Indian education runs on memory, not thinking. He described the system as one built on "ratta maaro and regurgitate in the exam," and said this style of learning leaves students unprepared for a world being reshaped by AI, electric vehicles, biotech, clean tech and advanced science.


The rot, he said, starts long before college. "Even your schooling years are not spent thinking. Even the schooling system focuses on ratto and regurgitate," he said. The consequence, in his view, is that India is missing out on entire industries of the future: "Na toh hum AI mein hain, na EV mein, na biotech mein, na clean tech mein," he said.

Numbers Don't Lie, Says Mukherjea

Mukherjea backed his argument with data rather than opinion. "Forget AI, we can see in the data itself," he said, pointing to India's graduate employment figures. "Out of every 100 graduates coming out of college, only three are getting a job in the year of their graduation," he said.

He added that graduate unemployment hovers around 30-40%, compared to roughly 3% among those who never went to school at all. His conclusion was hard to soften: "You are better off in India not going to university," he said, describing the university experience as a process of "rattafication" rather than genuine skill-building.

A Mumbai Reality Check

To drive the point home, Mukherjea turned to Mumbai's job market. A graduate hunting for an air-conditioned desk job, he said, often ends up earning less than someone doing physical labour on a construction site. "A construction worker will earn twice as much," he said, and a JCB operator, he added, can earn even more than that. He also pointed to his book Breakpoint, where he argues that some of India's best earners are people who finished Class 12 and never looked back.

The Chief Economic Adviser's Argument

Mukherjea isn't a lone voice. Speaking on an ANI podcast, Nageswaran said Indian students are stuck on a fixed conveyor belt, school, graduation, then either higher studies or a shot at exams like the UPSC, without pausing to ask whether that path still leads to a stable job.

In a video shared by ANI on X, Nageswaran said: "... Other countries that have actually grown successful, place a lot of respect on trade skills. In this country, we give them little respect... You should equip yourself with trade skills. The…"

He said India has long looked down on vocational work such as welding, plumbing, carpentry and electrical repair, unlike countries such as Switzerland, Germany, Japan, South Korea and China, where such trades are respected professions. The era when a software job, a computer science degree or an MBA guaranteed an edge, he said, is over. What comes next, in his view, belongs to trade skills, soft skills, and work that needs a human touch — the kind machines can't easily copy.

The Chef Who Felt Left Behind

Nageswaran shared a personal anecdote to make his case. He recalled speaking to a young chef who felt he was falling behind after comparing his life to friends in other, seemingly flashier, careers. Nageswaran's advice: stop measuring progress through social media, because the chef had learned a skill technology cannot easily take away. He added that fields like counselling, caregiving and hospitality could grow in importance in the years ahead.

Even Your Health Is an Economic Asset

Nageswaran also linked jobs to something less obvious, health. While much of the debate focuses on whether India will grow old before it grows rich, he said the bigger worry may be whether the country turns unhealthy before it turns prosperous. Citing the National Family Health Survey, he noted that obesity is rising across income groups even as other health indicators improve, driven by sedentary routines, low physical activity and late-night eating habits.

His closing message to young Indians was simple: build skills that machines can't replace, and treat your health as seriously as your qualifications, because in the economy taking shape, both will decide your pay cheque.