India's Tech Success: Powered By Sweatshops And Slave Labor

I am departing from my usual topics for this post but I think this topic is more important than any of the political games being played in New Delhi right now. Yes, it is about how some unscrupulous IT companies are exploiting India's IT professionals.
I have heard over the last few weeks several stories of how companies are forcing rookie programmers to work under the threat of legal action. Many of my readers may not be unfamiliar with the problem, but what has astounded me is the depth and scope of it.
It goes like this: a young chap just off college is recruited by an IT company. He is mostly from a small town or a village and not very familiar with the tactics being employed in the job market. Nor are his parents much aware of it - they are just too happy their son/daughter landed a job even before getting his/her degree.
Okay, now the guy finds himself in an office where he is not learning anything of value - he is being used as a simple coder (no major addition to his skills). Soon he get disenchanted and is looking for a way out. And given the scarcity of good workers in the Indian IT market, he sure enough gets an offer from another company. He wants to leave.
Now starts the game. His employer says he can't. They talk about a bond he has signed when he joined. They threaten legal action. They demand money for training expenses (!!!) incurred. They call up his parents and threaten them of legal action and criminal cases against their son. (Mostly such companies leave off the girls, fearing it could lead to harassment complaints being filed against them). They bring all sorts of pressure to bear - it is mental torture. And if the guy still insists on leaving they deny him any certificate to show his experience, and may even go to the extent of serving legal notices on him.
An advocate friend tells me 90 per cent of the time such companies win. The guy stays back - he resents it but he has no choice. If the bosses were sane guys they would have realized that having such people in the workforce is counterproductive. But then, they are sadists - they just want to ruin his life, just don't want him to make it in life!
Why do they do it? No easy explanation. It probably is just a mixture of some of these: bruised egos of the bosses, the difficulty in finding talent, resentment at your junior getting a higher paid and better job...
It sounds terrible and so improbable. But it does happen.
Why? Mostly because the young guys who face this problem aren't aware of their legal rights in this country. And because their parents are cowed down by the threats of legal action the company bosses make.
I recently helped a few such guys to get out of such a company. And I know those guys still have friends there who don't want to continue but are afraid to jump.
I am not saying all IT companies are like this, but there are many out there. A quick scan through some of the discussion boards will tell you what I mean.
We are talking of becoming an IT power. If we cannot guarantee basic rights to our IT talent how are we going to do that? Makes me wonder. And before you get me wrong, let me tell you this is not about cutting costs. These companies have the money but just treat their employees like shit. Maybe it is about mindsets not changing with the times.
We aren't talking about illiterate workers in some rural brick kiln being made to do bonded labor, but about our cutting edge workforce - our IT professionals - being treated like slaves. Are we out to build an IT superpower or an IT slave empire?