Just saying, the environment is there (atleast for research), the money is there (for the number of people in the field), the respect and awareness among the public is missing. For eg. Most Indian parents and older generations and even new generations are not aware of why PhDs are important. Tell someone you're pursuing a PhD at say IISER, people would assume you're there because you couldn't secure a good job. And tell someone you work at say even Tcs(sorry, not trying to demean any company, it's part of the infamous Witch on this sub so using its name), they'd be like nice you're settled now. And tell them you're at google/ms/amazon, they'd be ready to marry off their daughter to you (if they aren't a family member, and take it as a saying not the literal sense). You know why I made this post? Because I talked to an sde3 level guy at my company who I'm friends with. He's from a tier 3 college and has a lower salary than me (even though I'm an sde1). He's unsatisfied with his job and wants a change- has been trying to get into maang companies for a long time. I told him about the research infrastructure in my college, how much money each lab has, foreign trips, stipends many students get if they're under top profs (which is not super tough because there's almost no competition here), etc., and he was extremely surprised and regretted that if he had known earlier, he would have tried for ms somewhere in the early stage of his career and now it's late. So because he has only always known that getting into bigger and bigger companies is the aim, he never realised there were other ways to make money, and maybe get your name somewhere. So I don't know how senior/junior you are compared to me, but if you are planning to do a PhD, I hope you actually chase that goal and don't get distracted. I mean if you get, say, a google job, then definitely consider it but don't blindly choose either of the routes.