DIVERSIFIED, BUT NOT UNITED

Today when people in India, talk about the youth of India, they say we are immensely influenced by the West. Specially the political parties are of the notion that we, the youth of India have inculcated all the negatives from the Western culture, but the point I want to put forth is, Indian youth to a large extent has learnt optimism from the same western culture. The US president elect Barack Obama, gives a new point of discussion on the same old lines. His persona is inspiring and no one can disagree with that. Although his policies might or might not be beneficial to India, is a different story altogether. However the way he is preparing his country to face the crisis is something no Indian can ever think of.

Coming back to our motherland, a decade ago when Enron tried to establish a power plant in Maharashtra, ENRON faced a political warfare followed by the report of the Godbole committee which led to the failure of ENRON project, similar to what happened to NANO in West Bengal, except the fact that in ENRON project the opposition was in favor and the government itself was against it. The result, Maharashtra lost a golden opportunity to become self dependent in power sector. Today, people in Maharashtra would have been spared from load shedding, 6 hours in suburbs and up to 16 hours in villages. This is the best example of what I call diversified but not united. Clash of two political parties led to a loss of the state. Here is, where the Americans leave us far behind. In this crisis situation, the democratic leader Barack Obama & the Republican leader John Macain, decided to come together for the their own motherland. Together they will strive for what’s best for America. Today when global financial crisis is ready to knock at India’s door, when banks might be on the verge on bankruptcy; our political leaders are busy in a battle for banks, their vote banks.

This keeps the two countries worlds apart. In India, the focus is still on the forth coming election. The minority parties try to win their vote bank by staging a protest against current government trying to brainwash the lower uneducated class rather than educating them & the opposition and the left together play a hindrance role by opposing promising new deals & the list goes on. It’s high time that political parties in India like the youth be influenced from the west. Ironically this is the same country where people say there is unity in diversity, I would rather say diversified but not united.

INDIA INC - A NEW GIANT

INDIA INC – A NEW GIANT

Year 2008-09, all the strong economies of the world are on the verge of recession. Companies tryin hard to control sustain its operations, govt of their respective countries trying hard to block the fund erosion but with very limited effect. People go to their office just to find out that they have been given a pink slip, reason, the very old cost cutting policies of the company in this credit crunch situation.

Situation is not different in india, india inc is expected to cut off 25 % jobs in various fields like IT,brokerage services, bpo, airlines and construction. Amidst all these dark clouds we see a silver lining. India inc. can exploit this situation to its best interest with little optimism. Despite of the crisis situation many Indian co. like the sbi bank, the mahindras have shown excellent net qtr results which suggests that India inc is to a large extent insulated from the global crisis. The worst is miles apart from India, and the credit should go to the Indian industry which in last 2 decades has grown faster than a weed.

Though India felt the tremors of the global turmoil, some sectors in India are independent enough to resist these turmoil. Sectors like IT, SERVICES AIRLINES, HOTELS have been hit right where it hurts. This is the consequence of over dependency of this sectors on economies like us and uk. With every little policy change in these countries, affects the operations of industries of these sectors in India which in turn affects every single employee like you and me. These are the sectors which have grown in the last decade which are very much responsible for the 8% gdp growth of India. However now they face the challenge to contribute to sustain 7% gdp.

On the contrary we have sectors like fmcg and pharma which are emerging as the saviors of Indian economy. Industries in fmcg like the HUL & ITC which do not depend on foreign currency are unlikely to have an impact. These industries are self reliant and should see this crisis as an opportunity to take Indian economy to its peak level. These industries give india an optimistic approach to deal with this crisis and is also one of the main reasons why india is not amongst those worst affected.

Credit should also be given to this nda govt. and not to forget the finance minister, P. CHIDAMBARAM the governor of RBI, mr Y.V. Reddy.With all their expertise and experience they took some dauntless decisions to curb the excessive influx of foreign funds in the Indian market, the decision to raise the crr ratio and the interest rates when inflation was hovering around 12 %, a move which was initially picked apart. However this proved to be prophylaxis for the economic danger that lied ahead. Had it not been for their foresight and ingenius thinking, India would have been in the league of the worst affected nations of this economic crisis.

All said and done, how should we, the students graduating from various b-schools in India should look at this? Sure there will be fewer companies coming to the campus for the next two years. In such scenario MNCs and international placements will be like a mission to mars, a distant dream indeed. However we cannot ignore the fact that this gives companies in India to get the best brains from Indian b-schools. This would in turn lead to a reversal brain drain. The best brains which flew out of the nation to earn in dollars and pounds now working in our own land, leading to growth of India inc. Eventually India will get what it deserves, the services of one of the world’s most intelligent work force, i.e. we the Indian students. Lets give a thought to this, Indian companies sure have a great opportunity to retain some of the best students from IITs & IIMs and when that materializes no one can stop this nation from becoming a new giant.