All 3 of your observations are correct, but I wouldn't touch anyone who claims that they sit up late nights and climb through mountains of math and physics just to get "enlightenment". They have to be people who can't think straight, and are likely to strap on soosai vests one day. Or drop everything claiming "disillusionment" and head for the forest or sit under a tree.
Why the *** should those who do the work to top their classes throughout high school and college make 1/40th the pay of the dimbulbs who spent their evenings lounging? Money is an appropriate system of reward, the other stuff is bonus as I see it.
India is no longer a Poor Country - it has as many rich people as any country, and I mean RICH. Indian companies can afford to pay salaries, and they do pay with no regard to competence. Baboon (plural of Bahoo) such as the Chairman of IndusIndiots Bank get INR37million per year. That's right - 370 LAKHS. How many Indian engineers get paid INR 12 Lakhs per year?
And to do what? Read the Customer posts on the fB page of IndusIndiot Bank, and I agree with those from personal experience.
So the net is that India is still stuck in the Third World/African dictatorship mentality of treating engineers and scientists as dirt while enriching the goons. And there is Karma in operation here: A good whacking in a war that reduces the Palaces to rubble, MIGHT awaken the oiseules to the need to start being fair. Without hiking pay scales to world class (not the other way round which is what is happening: India is dragging down engineer pay worldwide) India cannot advance: until then, Indians will keep having to pay through the nose to buy glitzy gizmos made (often by the sweat and brains of Indians) in other countries. Nothing wrong there.. it is quite fair in the scheme of things. And this is evident in the LCA - I posted a few experiences of what it is like from visitor's pov at places that should be absolute Dream Jobs, such as ADA and DRDO and GTRE. Time to wake up to realities.
Start paying competitive salaries, and the best will come, and create an environment of excellence. It is ludicrous to see the faculty situation in India. Recently I heard a Mohterma Accountant from Dilli giving advice to an engineering PHD/MBA in the Yoo Ess, comparing university faculty careers to bijnej careers:
Yes, Americans only respect money. So there is no point in doing technology, you should just go into business.
Typical Indian arrogance coupled with abysmal ignorance.
Of course she had travelled to the Yoo Ess with a group of all Corruption-funded Baboos and their Real Estate co-crooks and tax dodgers.
In India teachers and university faculty are treated like dirt too, never mind the mouthings of "Guru" worship which is only for RollsRoyce Swamis and AK-47 Mullahs and B747 WhiteShoes Evangelists.
In countries that care about technological advancement, not just copying, technology people are not necessarily all billionaires, but I would say that the average engineer with 15 years experience is already well in the middle/upper middle class without cheating on real estate or taxes or marrying rich. Which means a decent life with the possibility of getting much further ahead. And enough sense to realize that the huge spires of wealth come with unacceptable prices in Life. So they settle down and focus on doing what they love.
In India, engineers were middle class - up until maybe 1970? Then corruption became the norm. Today the Productive Classes have been buried under the Indian Muddle Class - almost entirely enriched by bribes, crooked land deals, and dowry. Look at the structure of tax revenue in India - it is a real eye-opener. You understand why the IT form STILL asks:
Do you own Race-Horses?
and devotes a whole schedule to it.
The other aspect of the Indian system is the Retirement Age of 55. Super for the individual, it ensures some form of security for the rest of one's life, with nice Defined-Benefits and COLAs, so that one can then take out the ill-gotten bribe money and black money from hiding (no need to show Source of Income), get another job in private enterprise, and enjoy life. But what is the cost to the National system? An education to equip an engineer to deal with leading-edge problems takes up to Age 26 minimum, starting at Age 2? So.. 24 years of education, mostly paid by the taxpayer, to get 21 years of work, of which the first 2 are training, the last 3 are Coasting, and the remaining 16 are.. remembering the first 2, getting married, having dozens of babies and washing their little behinds, and waiting for the last 3.
Most of the really tough advances take 30 years of intense, persistent effort. Look at the names of the IEEE Medal winners, the National Academy of Engineering etc. A few political appointees, some who got in by sleeping with the old geezers, but mostly old geezers. With top-of-the-species brains, and enough experience and confidence to go after the really big breakthroughs. Youthful Energy and Drive are all great to make FaceBook, but Allah help the kuffars who depend on the Youthful to do the really tough advances in technology. (Even Google, if you look hard, grew on the strength of Database technology learned from the old geezers who grew up as young IBM and HP engineers in the 1960s - the Search engines are the dreams of those people, implemented by the wunderkinden who make the news with their SFO-JFK trips to buy shoes).
then it is 3...and others like Presidency now an autonomous univ.