But that is just it, you look at the back squat and say it causes a reduced mobility, it doesn't. That is the same line of thinking that has people thinking that if their knees come forward over their toes in a squat they will suddenly pop out and bounce around the room... or some other tragedy. I would say that the reduced mobility in powerlifters is because they are simply big freaking guys. Being obese is likely to reduce mobility, but I know that Dave Tate and Louis Simmons are always talking about targeting weak points, prehab movements and such. They clearly recognize that you can't walk into a gym, squat a few singles and then hope to be healthy. With their influence the days of the fat and cumbersome powerlifter that can't even walk up stairs without sweating out a half pound of bacon grease is going away.
Keep in mind too that it isn't the lift itself that is hard on the hips, it is the lift PLUS the weight these guys are handling. Your hips are strong, and for most beginners I would say that back squatting with 135 to even 400lbs isn't going to automatically cause undue wear and stress on the hips. It isn't that simple. Get a few years of 600+lb squats under your belt and no matter what you do it is going to cause extra stress. I can tell you now that I don't know any professional strongmen or powerlifters that have not had some kind of injury to deal with. Why? because lifting heavy stuff is a serious burden on your body. Lifting what your typical gym goer lifts is not. You can't compare the stress of a 900+lb squat in a suited scenario to a 350lb back squat without, they aren't the same animal. I would even go so far as to say that you can't compare a 400lb back squat to a 300lb back squat. Again, that is my experience. When I have been bench press minded, I can tell you that getting my bench press up over 300lbs is not a big deal. Getting it to 350 is considerably more work, and getting it to 400+ is absolutely gut wrenching amounts of work, dedication and stress. as I have never reached 425, I can only imagine the exponential amount of time and effort it would take to get there.
One last thing I would say about your squatting group, I would say that for the average gym member, your plan may be effective. What I mean by that is for those people where size and strength are more of an afterthought to "getting tone" it probably makes some sense to take it easy with them. But I have never trained that type. I train with football players, MMA guys, strongmen, and people that I would generally view as "dedicated to size and strength." To have them detrain by learning overhead squats would not be time well spent. To teach them how to squat more weight right off the bat with a form tweak would make good sense. From there they can move on to good mornings, front squats, deep box squats, high bar squats, whatever... but as I said, the standard powerlifting squat by virtue of its test of strength would be my staple. It would be the starting point that I would use, and it would be the benchmark I would utilize to show improved strength and performance.
I'm not saying you are wrong, Anuj or Eric, I'm just saying these are the reasons I would not fear I was doing someone a disservice by getting them to learn a solid back squat.
Arguing which type of squat you should teach first is like arguing whether a routine should be full body or body part, or whether you should use DB's or BB's. You can skin that cat any old way you would like, and in the end you would be foolish to rule out any useable tool.
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