Taking undue advantage of the current market situation, employers hire fresh graduates in the name of internship and pay them minimal remuneration for full-time workload. Indeed, some of the smarter organisations do not pay anything at all to their interns.
On the part of interns, they have to keep themselves motivated in the hope of getting their services regularised at the end of the internship period. That does not happen. The interns are then made to believe that their CVs will become part of human resource database, and they would be called whenever an opportunity crops up. Needless to say, that seldom happens. All that the interns get at the end of the stipulated period is an entry on their CVs. This sometimes works.
The organisations make the interns work full-time. These poor souls spend their time making photocopies, sorting out documents and sometimes even serving tea to their supervisor just to be in the good books of those who matter.
This is contrary to what students are told all through their academic life. Such practices create a negative perception about work culture in the minds of young graduates. In simple words, this whole internship thing, as practised currently, is nothing but corporate exploitation of the young. Fresh graduates do need to go through a period of hands-on learning, but it should happen without exploitation.
ALI GOHAR QAZI
SUKKUR
