MUMBAI: Some curious ogling and harmless street-side jeers at a local Eastern India bazaar prompted a Brazilian mining engineer and his wife to say no to a plum job offer from one of the world’s largest mining companies.The Australian product engineer of a manufacturing company agreed to an India posting only after he was assigned two personal bodyguards. A senior Japanese engineer firmed up his plans to relocate to India after he held long discussions with a local drinking-water supplier and district collector.Hiring expat professionals has never been more difficult for corporate India as it is now. Apart from hefty paycheques , prospective ‘foreign hands’ expect companies to specifically look into their personal safety, comforts and superfluity.As an increasing number of companies in India, both domestic as well as global multinationals, have their businesses in small cities and towns, hiring an expat is becoming a tough negotiation, said human resource heads and executive search consultants.India, once reckoned to be one of the much sought-after destinations that added to the repertoire of experience of an international talent , may be losing its charm or is becoming pricier for the companies. For those who are willing to risk a few years in India often ask for the moon — from air ambulance to personal bodyguards, gym and foreign-language training institute for spouses, tennis courts and club facilities — even at remote plant sites.Take the case of the senior Japanese engineer cited above who joined a multibillion-dollar Japanese engineering company in one of its industrial locations in South India. Before taking up the assignment, the executive not only wanted to visit the site but also sought to meet local administrators such as the district collector, NGOs, suppliers and water contractors to understand the ease of functioning at the location.“Such kind of demand would never be made when one is going to Europe or even South America. It arises from the concerns about bottlenecks in functioning smoothly in the country,” said R Suresh, founder of Insist Consulting. Among the demands expats make to move into industrial regions are international schooling or boarding schools for their kids in locations like Singapore for which they need separate compensation.A review visit of the local area before signing up is a must. If the spouse joins, they need adequate safety in the township, gym, spouse clubs and foreign-language training as spouses can use this time to learn new languages and vocations. Medical and accidents insurance are a must with key man protection against environment and safety incidents.The most important part is a fixed-term contract, contract-break protections, ease of forex conversion, tax filing help from the Big Four consultants and end-ofcontract bonuses if performance is exemplary. However, it is sometimes particularly challenging to hire expats as many of the industrial activities are moving to second-rung cities such as Aurangabad, Nashik, Udaipur, Nagpur and Vadodara, where finding many of these facilities would be difficult.“We primarily look at expats when we do not have expertise in a particular field. We are as flexible as possible depending on the criticality of the role and non-availability of local talent,” said Ramesh Shankar, HR head for South Asia at Siemens, which has facilities in Vadodara, Aurangabad, Nashik, and Goa among second-rung cities. “Expats ask a lot more questions than a local hire,” he said. A few companies offer worldclass amenities at their sites. For instance, Vedanta has golf and billiards facilities at Jhadsuguda in Odisha that cater to the demands of its expat population.“Most of our expats are part of executive committee or come in as technical experts and in leadership roles, and we provide them world-class facilities,” said Suresh Bose, a director at the Vedanta Group. However, not every company can afford to have such infrastructure in remote locations and for them it is a tough ask to hire expats for niche roles for which homegrown talent is not available, said experts.