New technology helps Indian engineers handle massive infrastructure push

India's massive push to build homes, hospitals, schools, airports, metro networks, data centres, roads, and rail capacity is forcing a major change in how engineers work. According to Iesh Dixit, co-founder and CEO of Powerplay, the current generation of engineers faces a much larger job than their predecessors, but they cannot complete it using old methods. On construction sites, trained professionals still spend much of their day on routine tasks like measuring quantities off drawings by hand, calling people to check on yesterday's work, and matching material registers with delivery challans. Technology adopted over the last two years has started to change this process by removing administrative burdens that crowd out actual engineering. Systems can now read multiple drawings at once, cutting estimation time from two weeks down to minutes. This allows an estimator to test twenty different approaches instead of just one, while procurement can match real project needs and contractors can track their cash position weeks in advance. Dixit notes that India cannot solve its construction demands simply by producing ten times more engineers, meaning each professional must become capable of handling far more through productivity tools. Furthermore, technology is no longer restricted to large companies with large IT teams and deep pockets. Modern systems now work directly with drawings, site photographs, paperwork, and informal messages, putting these advanced capabilities into the hands of mid-sized firms that build most of the country.