I would suggest you to "rephrase" what you said. Every case is different, I do have lot of friends here in Canada who came in for Diploma, completed that and now working full time. (and mind it some are even branch managers in financial institutions.)
Wondering if you were already eligible for PR then why would you even apply for Study permit and come in as International student and pay 3 times tution fees ??
And your fellow colleague who got his study permit rejected for UBC, does makes sense looking from immigration officer view. Offcourse who downgrade their education profile from working in well reputed full time job to do Diploma, unless he has some other intentions which are oblivious.
And working at timhortons or MacD is not an easy task man, people working there are proud of what they are doing unlike Indian mentality.
Good luck my friend.!!
I did not want to apply for PR and the fees are not that high as well the course I chose was a post degree in accounting which fulfils the pre requisites of CPA. I was not eligible for a masters