VSS Working for Microsoft partners is a dream come true but Syed Nisar Bukhari had to leave his job due to domestic issues and is now happily working in Kashmir where career for a computer professional isn’t too bright, Umer Beigh reports
Six year ago when, perhaps, the first on-campus recruitment took place in Kashmir University’s (KU) Masters in Computer Applications department, only four students were selected out of 50. Syed Nisar Bukhari, 29, was one among them.
“We were fortunate that Microsoft partners The Perfect Future (TPF) came here and I was lucky enough to get selected,” Nisar, who hails from Hajibal in North Kashmir’s Baramulla district, says.
“During my interview, I tried to gather what company demanded from me. And thanks to Almighty, I did well,” Nisar, who completed his Bachelors in Computer Application from Baramulla Degree College, says.
Nisar joined TPF in 2007 and worked diligently. He is one among the handful members of the trained team who designed the actual graft of the hindustantimes.com.
“hindustantimes.com was the first project I worked on. We put in a lot of effort for it. As this project started taking shape, I took my job seriously,” he says.
“Before we finished the project, the application we developed had to be first launched, integrated, and fixed. So we had to provide training sessions to their staff. I stayed in their campus for almost three months,” he says.
“The first six months of my job were a little frustrating. But once I got adapted to the conditions, I became used to such challenges. Such jobs demand you have to learn every single day. Every day you are assigned a new work which you have to finish within a specific deadline. This was difficult to handle during initial period of my career,” he points out. Once the project was finished, Nisar was transferred to National Information Center (NIC) which was working on a project for Food Corporation of Indian (FCI).
“I was given a special entry in the NIC project, where new technique like Microsoft Messenger Queuing (MSMQ) was required with which I was familiar.” he says.
“I was the only Kashmiri at that time who was shifted to the NIC project. It was little hectic considering that we had to build the project for all the states of India, “he says.
Nisar worked outside Kashmir for nearly three years before shifting back due to some domestic reasons in 2010.
“It was disappointing because I had become very addicted to such technical software work. If such condition won’t have prevailed may be I would have never returned to my native place.” he says.
Leaving TPF and coming back to Kashmir was a tough choice because there are no good opportunities here other than a government job. In year 2010 he applied for it and got selected in National Institute for Electronics and Information Technology (NIEIT) as a software engineer where he is involved in teaching, handling software sites, consultancy and training engineering graduates. The experience gained while working with TPF has helped Nisar in his new job and he says he is satisfied. “My intention now is to help these students learn more and in a better way to achieve new heights in their future,” he says.
In Kashmir, according to him, there are no such software developing companies and thus young professionals like him are forced to work outside Kashmir.
“It is tragic that people here are not ready to start such ventures. Unfortunately, what we should do is not what we are doing,” he laments.
“Many professionals who restrict themselves to working in the valley end up doing data entry jobs which is a shame, literally,” he says.
He recalls that during his time in KU, there were almost 135 candidates who had finished their degree. “At that time we used to become concerned about our future. But now around 900 candidates are coming out from various colleges yearly including KU with degrees such as B tech, B Level, MCA. The only question remains is of how to absorb these professionals,” Nisar says.
