Dream Job or Safe Job?

The Path Everyone Expects You To Take

“What do you want to be when you grow up, beta?”

This question dominates most conversations in Indian households. It echoes across dining

tables, family WhatsApp chats, and school corridors. But for many Indian teens, someone

else already decides the answer, often long before they’re old enough to understand what’s

at stake.

Medicine, engineering, and law. These aren't just careers in India; they're lifelines to

respectability, security, and family pride. The pressure to follow these “safe” paths is so

deeply woven into the fabric of Indian upbringing that wanting something different can feel

like rebellion. Ask a teen what they want to do, and the answer might come in a whisper—if

it comes at all.

India’s Unofficial Career Mandate

For many teens in India, the road to adulthood comes with just two lanes: engineering and

medicine. These careers are seen not just as choices, but as default expectations. India

produces approximately 1.5 million engineering graduates every year—yet only around 10% secure relevant employment, according to The Times of India. The story is similar in medicine. Around 90,000 students graduate with an MBBS degree annually, but only a fraction - roughly 7,000 to 10,000 - manage to land jobs or postgraduate seats within a year. Behind the prestige of these paths lies intense competition, underemployment, and a shrinking space for teens to choose differently. As for parental influence here, a Byju’s Career Guidance survey (2022) reported that 82% of Indian parents preferred medicine, engineering, or government jobs for their children, even when teens expressed different interests.

Living Up to Expectations- or Drowning in Them

The pressure to succeed doesn’t just shape timetables—it shapes identities. Teens across India are spending long hours in coaching classes, sacrificing sleep, friendships, and even mental well-being for the promise of a “safe” future. According to a 2021 NCERT survey, over 81% of Indian students reported feeling academic stress, much of it tied to expectations around competitive exams like NEET and JEE. The fear isn’t just about failure - it’s about disappointing families who’ve already built their dreams on these outcomes.

Many teens don’t feel like they can speak up. Emotional struggles are often brushed off as laziness or weakness. A 2021 UNICEF report found that only 7% of Indian adolescents have access to any form of mental health support, even though suicide remains the leading cause of death among young people aged 15 to 29, according to the NCRB. The stakes are high, and the silence is heavier than ever.

Between Two Selves

For many Indian teens, passion is something pursued in the shadows. By day, they attend NEET coaching, cram for entrance exams, and tell relatives they want to be doctors or engineers. By night—or in stolen moments—they draw, dance, write stories, edit videos, or rehearse lines for a school play they didn’t tell their parents about.

These are not just hobbies. They’re lifelines. But they’re often treated like distractions.

According to a 2023 LinkedIn Gen Z Career Study, 58% of Indian teens said they were interested in creative or unconventional careers, yet only 28% felt supported by their families to pursue them. Many keep these dreams quiet, fearing judgment, ridicule, or outright rejection. Some create anonymous Instagram art accounts or post reels under a nickname, trying to keep their worlds separate.

It’s not that these teens don’t understand the risks of creative careers - they do. But they also understand something deeper: that success without joy can feel hollow. So they live dual lives - fulfilling their family’s idea of stability while secretly nurturing their own idea of meaning.

Sometimes they succeed at both. But often, one version of themselves has to shrink to make space for the other.

Safe Isn’t Always Satisfying

For many Indian teens, the question “What do you want to be?” comes with only a few acceptable answers. The pressure to follow safe, familiar paths like medicine and engineering can leave little space for passion, creativity, or choice.

It’s time we ask a better question—not just “What will you be?” but “Who do you want to become?”

And more importantly, be ready to listen to the answer.

Written by Siyona Verma

Siyona wrote this article as a participant of the Media-Makers Fellowship's May'25 cohort.