In recent times, many countries in Asia have followed an approach of training and skilling below-poverty-line youth in trades that provide them jobs in urban centres. Thus, several thousand uneducated and ill-trained youth migrate to the cities with a dream of becoming affluent. In this context, it is a moot question to be asked if in this process are we not overcrowding the cities which are already grappling with the problems of unemployed youth. Would it not be a better option to encourage the rural youth by training them in technologies that provide them with a decent standard of living in a rural environment? In the name of empowerment are we not uprooting the rural youth and forcing them to live a subnormal existence in the cities? Let me just take one example of the kind of exploitation that these youths are subjected to in the metro cities. The Textile and Apparel sector requires a huge number of Sewing Machine Operators(SMO), Knitting staff, and Embroidery and Embellishment workers. In India, Bangladesh and China there are a few thousand so-called skilling and training agencies that run a 30-day patchwork program of training and migrate young boys and girls to the metros. What happens to these youth is a subject of serious research. While governmental agencies may gloat over the success of their programs, the plight and exploitation of these workers is nothing short of a cruel joke. Today around 65% of the female workers in Bangladesh are females. In China, this percentage is 90%. In India, it is around 60%. Most of the recruits are from the rural areas. They come to the cities with a dream of earning good wages that will help them in taking care of their dependents and generally improve their quality of living. In Bangladesh a garment worker gets 5300 Taka (US $68), Indian garment worker gets on an average of INR 7000 (US$ 104).  Out of the INR 7000 that the worker gets he/she has to pay around INR 3000-4000 towards stay. Around INR 4000 is needed for food. Thus there is no money left to be sent back to ailing parents or children. On the work front, the average garment worker has to put in 60 to 140 hours of work per week. The payment of overtime is a big fraud. People knowledgeable with the industry will vouch for the fact that many export houses have developed sophisticated software to hoodwink the audits that show payments of double Overtime whereas only single overtime is being paid. Let me take an example of the National Capital Region (NCR) of North India. The maximum concentration of such migrated rural workers is in the villages bordering Gurgaon, Faridabad and Noida. Workers live in tin or asbestos roof shanties. Water supply does not exist. No electricity. The plight of the females cannot be even mentioned. Most of them are routinely subjected to sexual exploitation in their shanties. At work, the lure of OT compels them to accede to the whims of their supervisors. Most of the companies provide no lunch. Their use of the washroom is strictly monitored. At the end of the month, most of them are out of pocket and they are forced to borrow the money from the local sharks which again becomes a source of exploitation. While one would like to believe that the yearly wage increase due to the dearness allowance (DA) may increase their earning you are in for a big surprise. They are paid ONLY the difference between their actual wage and the increase. Thus, we have a situation where the youth gets completely disillusioned and reduced to a sub-standard living and has absolutely nothing to look forward to. This is the harsh reality. In this backdrop let us examine the hypothesis that the rural youth can improve his quality of life by getting trained and coming to the cities for work. To me, it looks like a cruel joke. The better option would be to train for jobs that do not need him/her to migrate. The governments must work on this premise. This will reduce the load on the cities and will be a win-win option for all.