Meet Indian-origin CTOs leading OpenAI and Anthropic without IIT degrees

British sociologist Michael Young coined the word "meritocracy" in 1958, and he meant it as a warning. In his book "The Rise of the Meritocracy," Young imagined a Britain where talent, rather than birth, decided who rose to the top, and cautioned that this would simply produce a new elite, one convinced its privilege was earned rather than handed down. The word has since lost its bite and become a compliment people pay themselves.That tension sits at the heart of India's engineering education system too, where an Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) offer letter is treated with something close to reverence, the sort of institution parents invoke the way clergy invoke scripture.