"By keeping in mind the latest Java development"

Not sure what is the latest Java development?

"should they start embeded programing in Java or on C"

The whole raison d'etre of Java is its platform independence. Therefore, if you want to learn any specific platform - whether it be embedded, PC, VAX, UNIX, or whatever - Java is a bad choice.

If you want to learn specifically embedded programming, I think 'C' is a good choice - not too low level to get bogged-down in too much detail, and yet still low enough that you can still see the relationships to the underlying hardware architecture.

But if you want to learn embedded programming, and then have duh hire you, it'll have to be pure assembler! ;-)