Mech. Engg. - Its different

Saurabh Sehgal

Saurabh is a 2004 batch passout of Mechanical Engineering from Delhi College of Engineering (DCE). After his UG course, he joined Siemens India Ltd. He worked there for two years and later joined NITIE, Mumbai to do his MBA. Currently, he has been appointed as the demand planner for the modern retail division of Johnson and Johnson India Ltd. WiwBee thanks him for this contribution.

Its not just saying that “Mechanical engineers are the real/core engineers”.Its the only evergreen stream of engineering. Presence of large number of company heads/CEOs across all sectors is ample justification of above justification. So u all must be wondering that what separates mechanical engineers from other techies.

To understand this, let us dwell a little into past few decades. Due to the rapid industrialization just after independence, mechanical engineering was considered the most sort after choice of students. The chief sectors were power, oil & gas, steel (& other metals) and auto sector.

But with the boom in information technology (IT), demand for computer engineers increased rapidly. and being service driven streams, IT engineers were given better compensation. So the craze towards these branches increased manifold. But still, why the Mechanical/Civil engineers are heading these IT behemoths? This is because its not only about the subjects you study in 4 years of engineering, it is the hardship and grilling of diverse mechanical subjects which develops strong traits and characteristics in tender students and prepare them for future battles.

There are many mechanical subjects like Strength of materials, Design of Machines, Robotics, Automative Engineering, Industrial Engineering which not only give knowledge across diverse sectors, but also improve your analytical skills which prepare you for managerial roles later in a career.

It may either be the rub of grueling curriculum or the company of boys ( hardly u find any girl in mechanical batch ), the students are considered coolest or toughest of the lot. They are always involved in each and every activity if campus( good or bad , pun intended !). Though this may sound very vague , but this also helps in overall development of a person, as he/she gets prepared for every eventuality in life.

Now with rapid development and growth in economy, scope of opportunities for mechanical engineers has increased in a big way. With great real estate development , infrastructure is a new sunrise sector. Finance minister has announced to make India a small car hub last year. India is also one of the largest car equipment manufacturer of the world. India has ambitious plans to increase electricity supply by over 100 GW by next 5 year plan.With many metal (Steel , Aluminium) companies going for global expansion , scope is increasing for mechies/maccas and last but not the least, IT sector is always there for highly analytical mechanical engineers to back upon any time, if they have change of interest, which is not vice versa for other engineers.