Krishna's Story

This is the story of Krishna. He isn’t special in the conventional sense of the term, and has not received any distinctions in the way society describes them. But there is something which attracted me towards knowing more of the person who has been cooking meals for me for the past two months. He’s the cook at the paying guest house where I’ve been staying since my summer internship began a couple of months ago. 

Krishna is from Nepal, the only Hindu kingdom in the world today (and his name is so apt, isn’t it?). He has an elder brother who runs his own restaurant in the closest big town near his home. He says he always has an option to go back and work there. In fact, his family and his brother keep asking him to come back to Nepal and work with him. 

Krishna says he wanted to join the army. He applied for Nepal army and cleared all the tests, he tells me proudly. But he was left out in the written exam. Not left out exactly, but they were willing to secure his seat only if he gave them six months of his salary. Yes, I know you read that statement again. It’s true, though. They asked him for a bribe, shamelessly hidden in a verbal cloak of “salary”! I guess the obvious irony escaped them that they are asking him money so that they can give him money for his services. “I had gone there with only money enough for travel expenses, so I did not have that kind of money on me then. So I called my dad. But we lived far off, and by the time dad arrived, they had given the seat to someone else”. 

His chest automatically juts out slightly and chin turns upwards when he says that his dad was in the Indian Army, and bravely served in the Assam Rifles regiment until retirement. Krishna’s application and interest in the Indian army meant that he dropped out of school after 10^th standard – he looks down and admits this with a slightly ashamed laughter, enough to put across the impression that he regrets it somewhat, but not so much that he dislikes his life right now. Oh yes, he likes it here. 

Though he misses home and nostalgia floats up to the surface of his eyes when he says that he had not been home for one year now. He normally visits home every 5 to 6 months for atleast a month at a time, but this time Dilip, Krishna’s deputy cook and cleaner in this apartment, wanted to go home as he had not been there since long. So Krishna skipped a trip home and decided to be magnanimous and endure the hot summers of Indore. “I’m at home during this time every year. I always spend summers at home, where it is cool and nice”. Krishna speaks in an understandable Hindi, and seems quite comfortable with it. “I did not know any Hindi when I first started working in Noida, but learned it within 2 weeks. It’s almost same as Nepali, not very different”. 

When I ask him if there’s any sort of problem while crossing the border, Krishna answers, “No absolutely not! Even you can go there any time you want”. He says his younger brother is studying commerce in a college in Nepal. “He shall be easily able to get a good job somewhere,” he says quite confidently. Then Krishna goes on to explain me the process through which “big” companies located out of India normally conduct their interviews of Nepali candidates. “It mostly happens over the phone. And if they select you, you can easily go across the border to work”. 

I ask him if he was always good at cooking. He looks meditatively towards the now blackish bulb of Brinjal that simmered, enveloped by the flames of the cooking gas, before answering: “I used to wash dishes for a 5-star hotel in Nepal when I was 18. I washed those dishes from morning 9 to evening 9, without halting. I did it for six months, before one day I was promoted in the same hotel as deputy cook. I spent some time at that place, but I had some misunderstanding with my employers. But I walked out because I did not want to make a scene out of it. My father is a very reputed man in that area, and I did not want to let down his name by being involved with something unsavoury and worthless. So I left that place myself before the situation got out of hand”. 

He regretfully says that he could have joined Indian army too, but it’s a bit late now, since he’s 24. He plans to go back to Nepal after working here for 18 more months. It would be good then. He earns Rs 8500 each month here, and it’s enough as he gets to save almost all of it, considering he has a place to live and eat. He plans to go back and do “bijiness”, like his elder brother. To go home he has to go to Kanpur first, from where he gets a ride to the border. It takes a total of almost 24 hours to get to the border. From there he can ride a taxi or a bus to his place. 

His is a simple and uncomplicated life. Or seemingly so. I don’t know why I wrote about him. I just have a feeling there’s something special in his simplicity, something that I’m not yet able to put my finger on. I just thought his story needed to be told. If we look closer, maybe there are lessons to be learned from Krishna’s life, like there are from everything and everybody around us. We need to be humble enough to not just look, but take notice.  

India-Pakistan: Nuclear Deterrence or On the Brink?

"Our cities and forests, our fields and villages will burn for days. Rivers will turn to poison. The air will become fire. The wind will spread the flames. When everything there is to burn has burned and the fires die, smoke will rise and shun out the sun". These are the words in which Arundhati Roy describes a likely scenario (scary, eh?) in case a country (rather the few people in power) decides to press the “nuclear button”. Forgive me for diverting from context when the article has hardly begun, but the term “nuclear button” always made me imagine a red button covered by a cap which you can flip and open, something like they showed in erstwhile Hindi movies like Mr India and Karma (funny how Anil Kapoor was a part of both these movies!). 

Coming back to the topic, it is ghastly to imagine a use of nuclear weapons today. Nuclear or Hydrogen bomb being actually used for a destructive purpose is analogous to man landing on the moon. We have read about it in textbooks, the sheer agony and annihilation of one and the sublime glory of the other. The fact that nuclear or hydrogen bomb has not been used since is something we can all rejoice in. But do we remember how close we, and the world, came to a nuclear catastrophe when India openly tested its nuclear weapons (the event which came to be known as Pokharan-II) in 1998 within three months of an extremely nationalistic government coming to power? Dr Abdul Kalam described the event as: 'I heard the earth thundering below our feet and rising ahead of us in terror. It was a beautiful sight'. I guess his excitement also stemmed from a sense of nationalism and pride, though he must be well aware (who else could be, if not him) of the destructive effects such a weapon can have if someone takes one step ahead of “nuclear deterrence” and indulges in actual use. 

Between 1964 and 1974, China conducted fifteen nuclear tests. It is easy not to doubt that this behaviour of China had a role to play in India’s first nuclear test (Pokharan-I) in 1974 under Indira Gandhi’s leadership. I wonder what, apart from the sense of pseudo-nationalism as I would like to call it, were the reasons behind Pokharan-II in 1998. What’s clear is, though, that Pokharan-II led to Pakistan carrying out six nuclear blasts (one more than India’s five) in the Chagai hills in the following month. 'The whole mountain turned white' was how Pakistani government described the scene. No wonder this sudden nuclear proliferation in the subcontinent was followed, a year later, by something that came extremely close to a nuclear holocaust in the form of Kargil “incursion”, as we like to call it, underplaying the extremity of the situation. 

Winston Churchill in his last speech to the House of Commons in 1955 uttered the popular words: ‘safety will be the sturdy child of terror, and survival the twin brother of annihilation’. But of nuclear deterrence, he also said that it ‘does not cover the case of lunatics or dictators in the mood of Hitler when he found himself in his final dug-out’. Many feel this might be applicable to the subcontinent, where the uncomfortable closeness of the Pakistani military to the terrorists is common knowledge. Even ignoring this possibility, another logical question arises which Amartya Sen explores in his book The Argumentative Indian. He states that one meaning of nuclear deterrence is that two countries shall refrain from going to war because of the very knowledge that they own nuclear weapons and an aggression on one’s part may lead to mass destruction. In fact, if there is any straightforward benefit of owning nuclear weapons, it should be this. But, he states, the very fact that the year next to the one when India and Pakistan carried out nuclear tests, they went to war in 1999, pokes a million holes in that argument.  

Sometimes I like to believe that much has been changed in the last decade. Nations have realized that diplomacy through war and the threat of it cannot ensure lasting peace. The threat of a nuclear weapon being used has decreased drastically as the world economy has teetered on the brink of a catastrophe of its own kind. This has made nations realize that cleaning up your economic backyard is more important and less transitory than any sense of acquired power a nuclear proliferation might provide. Although I do believe that the holier-than-thou attitude carried by the big five nuclear powers is condescending if not deprecating. But giving the argument of “why not total nuclear demilitarization” to move towards a situation which has been proven not to give India any obvious advantages (in fact giving India a plethora of disadvantages), appears as illogical as it is inane.

Satyamev Jayate: Really Creating a Difference or Just Another Talk Show?

This article by Aamir Khan appeared in The Hindu on May 16, 2012. There was good amount of response to the article. I have re-posted the article here, as well as my response to it. The link to the article is provided at the end. Please have a look at other comments too, as they register the concerns and complaints of a lot of us.

Let's learn to talk, and listen

Aamir Khan

One of the biggest learnings for me in the process of researching for the issue of child sexual abuse came when I asked our expert, Dr. Anuja Gupta, why children who are sexually abused find it difficult to tell their parents about it. Her reply was, “Are we listening to our children? Are we even capable of listening to them?”

And that indeed is the big question.

What is my relationship with my child? Am I listening to my child? Really listening? What do I know of what is going on in my child's head? Do I know his/her fears, dreams, hopes? Am I even interested? Am I friends with my child?

Though my generation is perhaps more communicative with our children than that of our parents… or, at least that is what we would like to believe… still, how many of us are really solidly connected with our kids? How many of us really have the time and bandwidth that it takes for a healthy friendship? The fact is that only if there is healthy communication, trust, and friendship will your child feel comfortable and fearless to share everything with you. Obviously we pray that no child need ever face the trauma of sexual abuse; but if this does happen, the child should feel empowered to communicate this.

Through conversations and communication we build the ability to share our joys and fears. When these communication lines open up between parents and children, they become the start point for many issues to get sorted. Then if something does happen with your child, he/she will feel free to immediately come and tell you… and you will be able to address the problem then and there, head on.

The cornerstone of open communication is also trust. Our children observe us closely. They have an innate sense of being able to gauge our responses. If we want them to speak up, we should also ensure that we let them know that they will be believed. Yes, not just heard, but believed. Children are intelligent and intuitive, and we have to instil the confidence in the child that we are sincere about listening, and that we trust the child.

The other big learning came from Padma Iyer, who is Harish's mother. If a child does report sexual abuse, very often our first thought is — “how can I take action against my own family member? Family ki izzat, humaari izzat, mitti mein mil jaayegi, log kya kahenge, mere bachcheke saath aisa hua to hiss baat ko chhupao.” Like Padma, first we refuse to admit the possibility of it happening, and then we try to hide it. And because we have hidden it, we are unable to take action on it. Through all of this, we are thinking of others, of society. But we forget to think about our child. That child who is perhaps four, five or six years old… who has been through something most traumatic… who is reaching out to us because we are the parent… and the child can only reach out to us… what about that child?

Our child has to be our primary concern, everything else secondary. At such a time, we should only be thinking of what our child is going through, and what we need to do for the sake of our child. That's it. At the end of this process of healing, the child has to come out stronger and healed. And we have to do everything in our power to make that happen.

Also, we have to start looking at child sexual abuse as a crime, because that's what it is. When there is a theft in your home, don't you kick up a ruckus and say, “Hey! Somebody came to my house and stole some jewellery! What's happening? What is the security doing?” But if abuse happens in your home, we hush it up. Why are you hushing it up? Has the child done something wrong? No. So why are you hushing it up? You should shout, “How dare somebody come to my house and do this to my child.” Kick up a ruckus! That person should be behind bars! Even the law enforcers need to really take this seriously. And above all… the child needs to know how much his/her safety and security means to you.

I have already mentioned on the show that the present Parliament is working on a Bill regarding child sexual abuse and we look forward to a strong, effective, and well-implemented law for the protection of our children against sexual abuse. And we hope it happens soon.

In closing I'd like to leave you with a thought… perhaps the more closed or narrow minded we are about sexuality, the more repressed it gets, and then it manifests itself in ugly ways. I'm hoping that as a society in time we will reach a stage where we are not frightened of our sexuality. Rather, we learn to deal with it in a dignified, open, responsible and healthy manner.

Satyamev Jayate!

(The author is an actor. From next week, his column will be published in The Hindu every Monday).

My Comment: 

India, to me, will never be any kind of power (forget a 'superpower' that it most vocally aspires to be) unless it cleans its own long dirty backyard. Since Nehru's 'Tryst with destiny' moment, although it did enough to bring in a new light of hope, we have time and again betrayed the trust of this once great nation and its people. I've been reading Amartya Sen, and according to him, there is not enough political importance given to basic issues eating away our society like child abuse, female foeticide, gender discrimination, discrimination on the basis of fair skin, and other similar traits which are deeply rooted in our society and our behaviour and politically, they get little support. This is mostly because today there's little or no discourse about such issues in the political circles. The ruling parties make merry to the beat of power and the opposition widely yawns, comfortably forgetting all the ills that need urgent attention today.

It is people like Aamir Khan who can use their social capital to create some sort of uncomfort among the indifferent populace, because only through their pressure can come some sort of a political expediency. These deeply embedded issues can only be addressed if they become the top priority of today's politicians (something which is a distant dream, as of now), but such shows will help build public pressure on them to act. I would go so far as to say other celebrities in India who have a huge social capital, like say Sachin Tendulkar and Amitabh Bachchan should stand up to the challenge and endorse such similar issues, not just superficially, like appearing in an ad campaign, but a lot more, in a lot more engaging way. Today's youth don't read journals, they don't read expert opinions on economic and developmental issues. But this is something which can bridge that gap very effectively. Kudos! Looking forward to that Monday column.  

The article and comments can be found here.

Association of a celebrity like Aamir Khan with an esteemed newspaper like The Hindu is not a very common thing to happen. Maybe the people at The Hindu have realized the kind of social importance that a show like Satyamev Jayate holds, and the amount of readership that Aamir Khan's columns would attract. Is it an example of The Hindu once again staying true to its ethos or is it making an effort to gain some commercial readership (finally)?

What do you guys have to say about this? Does a show like Satyamev Jayate make any real difference to the society, or is it a waste of money and resources and it's growing popularity the start of yet another show of fickle behaviour of people that we have witnessed time and again?

Rampant Racism or Natural Human Behaviour?

This article appeared in Outlook magazine in the June 29, 2009 issue. I came across it recently and it appealed to me so much that I knew I had to re-post it to get the message across to a lot of people in India who live with this sense of false pride I have sensed time and again. Do follow the link at the bottom of this article to follow the rest of the comments because they provide with a lot more insight on the subject, including some other personal experiences.

opinion

'India Is Racist, And Happy About It'

A Black American's first-hand experience of footpath India: no one even wants to change 

In spite of friendship and love in private spaces, the Delhi public literally stops and stares. It is harrowing to constantly have children and adults tease, taunt, pick, poke and peer at you from the corner of their eyes, denying their own humanity as well as mine. Their aggressive, crude curiosity threatens to dominate unless disarmed by kindness, or met with equal aggression. 

Once I stood gazing at the giraffes at the Lucknow Zoo only to turn and see 50-odd families gawking at me rather than the exhibit.

On a visit to the Lucknow zoo, people gawked more at me than at the exhibits.

Parents abruptly withdrew infants that inquisitively wandered towards me. I felt like an exotic African creature-cum-spectacle, stirring fear and awe. Even my attempts to beguile the public through simple greetings or smiles are often not reciprocated. Instead, the look of wonder swells as if this were all part of the act and we were all playing our parts. 

Racism is never a personal experience. Racism in India is systematic and independent of the presence of foreigners of any hue. This climate permits and promotes this lawlessness and disdain for dark skin. Most Indian pop icons have light-damn-near-white skin. Several stars even promote skin-bleaching creams that promise to improve one's popularity and career success. Matrimonial ads boast of fair, v. fair and v. very fair skin alongside foreign visas and advanced university degrees. Moreover, each time I visit one of Delhi's clubhouses, I notice that I am the darkest person not wearing a work uniform. It's unfair and ugly.

Discrimination in Delhi surpasses the denial of courtesy. I have been denied visas, apartments, entrance to discos, attentiveness, kindness and the benefit of doubt. Further, the lack of neighbourliness exceeds what locals describe as normal for a capital already known for its coldness. 

My partner is white and I am black, facts of which the Indian public reminds us daily. Bank associates have denied me chai, while falling over to please my white friend. Mall shop attendants have denied me attentiveness, while mobbing my partner. Who knows what else is more quietly denied?

"An African has come," a guard announced over the intercom as I showed up. Whites are afforded the luxury of their own names, but this careful attention to my presence was not new. ATM guards stand and salute my white friend, while one guard actually asked me why I had come to the bank machine as if I might have said that I was taking over his shift. 

It is shocking that people wear liberalism as a sign of modernity, yet revert to ultraconservatism when actually faced with difference. Cyberbullies have threatened my life on my YouTube videos that capture local gawking and eve-teasing. I was even fired from an international school for talking about homosociality in Africa on YouTube, and addressing a class about homophobia against kids after a student called me a 'fag'.

Outside of specific anchors of discourse such as Reservations, there is no consensus that discrimination is a redeemable social ill. This is the real issue with discrimination in India: her own citizens suffer and we are only encouraged to ignore situations that make us all feel powerless. Be it the mute-witnesses seeing racial difference for the first time, kids learning racism from their folks, or the blacks and northeasterners who feel victimised by the public, few operate from a position that believes in change. 

Living in India was a childhood dream that deepened with my growing understanding of India and America's unique, shared history of non-violent revolution. Yet, in most nations, the path of ending gender, race and class discrimination is unpaved. In India, this path is still rural and rocky as if this nation has not decided the road even worthy. It is a footpath that we are left to tread individually.

---

(The writer is a Black American PhD student at the Delhi School of Economics.)


My Comment:

Mr Kuku, 

First of all I would like to apologize from the bottom of my heart on behalf of my fellow countrymen for the treatment meted out to you. I know the tendency among my countrymen to give preference to fair skin in every field of life. Being a North Indian, I am also well aware of the fact that this practice is more prevalent in North India than in South India. But there are some intricacies that need some discussion. 

First of all, it’s not racism. It’s more a fascination for the white skin (which is exemplified by the fact that Indian Premier League (IPL), Cricket’s top tournament currently, has white cheerleaders of every team!). And the primary reason that this is prevalent more in North India than in the South is that an average North Indian is, so to say, fairer-skinned than an average South Indians. Also, over the past few decades, education has been held more important in the Southern states of India and has thus had a greater impact in South India than in the North. This is another reason for the backwardness of thinking of the people in the North. 

Another important thing of note is that India is full of very different cultures, and you will find people with very different personalities and preferences over a distance of just a hundred miles. Not all cultures breed this exclusionary attitude. Hailing from Shimla in Himachal Pradesh, and having lived in Shimla, Chandigarh, Indore, Pune, Mumbai and Bangalore, I can vouch for the fact the people from Himachal Pradesh, being hill people, or may be because of some other reason, are much warmer towards people and would go completely out of the way to help you out, no matter what is the colour of your skin. And I’ve seen it happen – it’s all there in the speech, in how strangers reply to you. It all comes across, and I’ve had the privilege to compare this nature of the natives of all the six cities. So when you say North Indian, let us not generalize. The same goes for New Delhi. If you feel people of New Delhi are more inclined in their preference towards the fairer skin, that may be true, but then there are a lot of people who will be very helpful and who will never discriminate on the basis of your skin colour. Delhi has a population of over 22 million, and people in Delhi come from all over, especially the labour class, most of which is a victim of urbanization from the poorer nearby states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and the kind. It all depends on who you are interacting with. ATM people and autowallahs have very low education levels, as most of India is still very poor. Almost none of them have had any exposure to different cultures within their own country, let alone abroad. So it is their ignorance and naivete that comes across as “racist” to you. I know it’s very hard for you facing all this every single day, but I would like to ask you to forgive us for our poverty, which perpetrates lack of belief in basic education, which thus makes people behave like this. 

We were ruled by Britishers for over 200 years. And this is the time during which poverty in India became widespread, as we were denied very basic human rights by the Britishers, and we were persecuted for a long time by those who forcefully ruled us and treated us like speck of dust on their shoes. Maybe this deep rooted preference for white skin emanates from this subconscious idea that was hammered into our minds that white people are superior. Who is to blame? Widespread poverty and a very late opening up of our economy to the outside world perpetrated this thinking and in a society where caste discrimination was already rooted since millennia, a new aversion towards darker skin was not difficult to assimilate. That said, I have to mention that it is a very sad state of affairs, and I feel ashamed of this bigoted behaviour on the part of my countrymen. 

Specific to the problems faced by you, I think the gawking that you get is more out of curiosity and our own lack of awareness or access to the outside world. This is mainly attributed to the fact that there are very low Africans present in India. This goes for any place where an outsider comes when the people are not used to his/her presence. A white skinned person goes to Goa, and he might as well feel at home. Let him go to the north-eastern states of India, and see the kind of discrimination and gawks does he have to face. Let him go to a small village where people have never seen a person with such a fair skin, and then see the kind of stares and whispers and comments he gets. It’s all about how “developed”, to use a word that everyone here can relate to, the country is, and India, sadly, despite its tries of pomp and show in the Commonwealth Games and buys of the best of their kind military fighter planes, and it’s ambitions of being a superpower – notwithstanding all that, India is still a developing country and, with the kind of burdens and problems of population, deforestation, lack of basic education, or mass poverty that it faces, India will continue to be in the “developing” bracket, according to me, for many years to come. And a change in attitudes and acceptance of people of all colours, creeds, castes and communities will come with time, no doubt about that. What I have said in defence of my countrymen, in no way lessens the anguish I felt when I read your article and continued to read all the comments on it, and my sincere heartfelt apologies for all that happened.

For other comments, refer to the link below:
http://www.outlookindia.com/feedbacks.aspx?typ=100&val=250317


Friends, what do you guys have to say about this? Do you believe this is a shameful act on the part of Indians, or do you think this is a part and parcel of everyday life everywhere in the world? What are your thoughts on it?

Decode Yourself Organizationally

This was a part of an Organizational Behaviour assignment. We were supposed to write futuristic answers. Although these answers are different for everyone, this is what I had to say about being in a manager's role in the future. 

1.  Which is more likely to increase learning: a winning moment with reflection and recognition or a classroom training experience? Which is more likely to aid in development?

There can be no doubt that a winning moment with reflection and recognition will be much more of a learning experience than a classroom training session. When you win, the adrenalin pumps in your body and your heart beat increases. But more importantly, you reach, atleast temporarily, a level of consciousness where reflection becomes easier and introspection becomes all-too-familiar. In such a state, when there is a heightened sense of accomplishment and positivity and optimism surrounds the person, it gets much easier to tell the person of his strengths and weaknesses, and the critical balance between the handling of these two that led to that person’s success. Moreover, the person will even listen, and will not get defensive on hearing his weaknesses. That is the power of victory – it makes you wiser, and it makes you a person much more receptive to feedbacks. If provided in the right manner, these feedbacks can form the backbone of a very strong character later on. There is a certain feeling of goodwill which envelopes you when your hard work is being recognized. This is a moment a person will be proud of his achievements. So one should try to use this moment to let the person know his worth, and aid in his development and learning.

Classroom training sessions give you a perspective. And I believe that is what MBA does too. And only that. It can add only a new perceptive to your belief system, but it cannot make you learn things. You cannot sit in a classroom and learn how you would behave with your team members in times of conflict. You cannot learn such stuff from books. Books cannot teach you behaviour. It can only be learned by actually interacting with people, or actually working in teams. This is the only solution. Books and classroom can only tell you how far you can think, how far great people who lived before you thought. So it tells you of the horizons of others, it tells you of the thought process of others. But it does not tell you your own potential. Your own potential can only be learned by actually going out there. And a winning moment of reflection and recognition can serve as a great learning tool.

2.    Are you diligent about talking with your employees about their progress? Mention what you would do and how would you do it. What ‘measurements’ would you use to track your progress; the progress of your employees?

Talking to your employees about how they have been performing is very essential. Consistency cannot be achieved if feedback is missing. When a person is not sure how efficiently he has been performing, or he does things and he does not know the ones which were profitable and the ones which turned into losses, how would he ever know how to choose between the two? He would never know the right decision from the wrong one if constant feedback is not provided. And providing this feedback is the role and responsibility of his superior, that is, I. I shall be very diligent about talking to my employees about their progress, because such a behaviour from my side will drive efficiency in the entire team. I would start a concept called The Progression. One Progression would happen every Friday, where we would first discuss the progress made by each of the team members during the whole week, and then I would talk about their progress in front of the whole team, as if it is something the whole team should know about. It is actually, as one team member’s performance can make or break the entire team. I need to know what is the progress being made on different accounts, and then I will give back my feedback and opinion of each member of the team. I will come prepared for it based on what I had noticed about each team member in the whole week, and also listen to the progress made by them which they will detail to the whole team at the start of each Progression, which would be held before the end of every week.

I would rate the progress on the following two factors (one that I would notice, one that would come from others): i) Sociability – What dynamics does a person share with his team members. This does not mean that he needs to have lunch with them, or go out with them, etc. But he should have a few people atleast who he gels well with and feels very comfortable around. Presence of such people is very necessary for a person to feel connected to a place, and if they are missing, the person might feel disenchanted by the place and may as well leave it soon. ii) Peer Feedback – I would like to see how the person is evaluated by his peers. This would differentiate the people who actually work, from the slackers and the sycophants. There are a lot of people in an organization who do not work much, but at the end of the day shoot a mail to the boss, and keeping everyone else in the CC, trying to take credit of someone else’s achievement just because they did a very insignificant part of it. Presence of such people would come out through this exercise. Also, there are always people who are disliked by everyone in the team. Most of the people do not want to work with them, and if paired together, would not like to share the responsibilities of the work with that person. Even if such a person is extremely profitable, his mere presence is detrimental to the interests of the organization as it kills team spirit. Thus weeding out such people is extremely important.   

3.    What development do you need to excel as a leader or manager? What do you need from members of your group to aid in your development?

I believe that one thing that I need, more than anything else, to excel as a leader or a manager is to learn to be empathetic towards my team members. Before we get lost in clichés, I would like to explain what this word ‘empathy’ means to me. To me, it means being considerate towards others’ feelings, to know when and where to say the right thing, to try to understand what is going on in the name of ‘team dynamics’ within the team under you, who is feeling threatened, who is losing interest in the work, who is the champion who works without complaining and without being a part of the race to claim credit for the work done, who is the one who drives profitability the most, who is the one who makes the team gel together, etc. These things can only be known if a manager is empathetic. Moreover, I believe I can be a better listener, as listening to what the team under you has to say to you is very important. There are a lot of times when your subordinates have a lot of complaints from the system, and they feel they have been wronged. At such times, they should feel that there is someone to share their grievances. More importantly, you should leave your ivory towers and be approachable by your subordinates. Another challenge I feel the managers universally face is to balance strictness with openness. Today’s managers need to learn to love and be strict at the same time. What is important is to know when to be strict, and while being friendly, not to cross that thin line, or your subordinates might start taking you for granted.

One thing I believe would help me along the path of improvement, as a manger, would be to receive reverse feedback from my subordinates about my performance. I have not experienced this thus far, but I believe this can be a very humbling experience and there is a treasure trove of learning that needs to be unearthed here by digging at the right spot. 360 degrees feedback, if applied universally, can break the unjustifiably high egos of some of the managers, and would immensely help in keeping their feet on the ground. Also, you would know what your subordinates expect from you, and how well you are actually doing well on those parameters, rather than just believing that you are doing well. Moreover, getting a feedback from a subordinate would serve to break the barriers of formality and make that person open up to you better.  

4.    How will you create opportunities to communicate and discuss mission? How is mission important in the workplace culture?

“Mission” can be defined as the raison d’etre of an organization. It is the reason why whole organizations exist. Without a mission, organizations would be like a rudderless boat sailing in the treacherous sea of the business environment. It would become very difficult for an organization to survive if it does not have a purpose, and a reason for doing what it does. There should be a clearly defined goal, of what the organization aims to achieve, and that is delineated by its mission. Mission needs to be the lifeblood of an organization, and thus of every member of it. While working, each step that an employee takes should be justified by the mission of the whole organization. If it does not resonate or fall in line with the mission, it is futile, a waste of resources. As a manager, it would be my duty to make sure that each of my subordinates has one eye on the mission while they go about their daily activities. I will make sure that his every step integrates well with the bigger picture. I will organize monthly meetings where every one of my subordinates will be present and the bigger picture will be communicated to them – where the company is headed in terms of profits, what are the new markets the company is looking towards, what is its competitive advantage where it scores higher compared to competitors, and other strategically defined benchmarks. Having worked in an organization, I have realized that a disconnect occurs because most of the engineers working at the most basic level and doing all the actual work are not in the know of strategic aspects and the reason why they should be working on these things at all. No one involves them with this, and these discussions are limited to the upper echelons of the corporate hierarchy. Very few of the Team Leads or even Assistant Managers understand well the “why(s)”, all they know is the “what(s)”. I would like to rectify this mistake by creating opportunities to interact with my subordinates about the happenings at the bigger front.

Workplace culture is defined and created by the mission of the whole organization. A workplace should reflect the underlying ethos on which the organization was established and these ethos should be a part of how an employee conducts himself in the organization. I believe how a person conducts himself outside of the organization is equally important, as apart from “living his principles”, he is also representing his company tenets in his behaviour, and whatever he does an employee becomes the work of the organization, in the eyes of a layman. Thus it is important to carry yourself with grace and be morally upright.

The Speech That Was Never Delivered: Corporate Futsal Tournament

Prologue 

I was supposed to deliver the following speech at Retina India Corporate Futsal Tournament organized entirely by us. Retina India is an NGO, and since some time we had been trying to think of something to organize at a managable scale which helps build Retina India's brand in Pune as well as develop corporate connections. The event was a success, and this is a speech which I had prepared, but I did not deliver it due to certain reasons. Now that the event is over, I would want to share with everyone what I had to say. 

"Over 60 years ago, the world witnessed something that changed the course of every nation. A country based on disparate ideas and cultures, with people who dressed different, ate different, spoke different and thought different came together to break away from the shackles of servitude and established a democratic and secular government. The people who lived at that time had an overdriving purpose, one that overshadowed all other personal wants and ambitions. The idea of attainment of freedom was brought out, discussed, disseminated and became an important part of everyone’s daily life. This was the reason why the freedom movement had such a huge impact – people used to live and breathe independence. There was a higher purpose. 

The India of today is very different. We have grown and have been able to lift many millions out of poverty, especially in the last two decades. We have the latest technology on our mobile, we have access to the best brands, we can boast of being the most competitive in the industry of tomorrow, we are considered to be a largely English-speaking nation by the Western world, and they say that our demographics are going to be our weapon and our saviour in the years to come. But there is a sad side to it all. 

We are becoming more and more individualistic. Everyone is busy in accumulating more wealth than thy neighbour. Materialism has seeped deep into our daily lives, and as we spend increasing amount of time in front of digital media and the internet, and read less and less, we notice that idealism is being laughed at, and having a strong value system is derided. Why do we not encourage the one who is winning rather than pulling him down, why do we try to put up a face that is not our real self, why is our dream job always never the one that we are actually into, why don’t we find satisfaction in what we do, why is most of our adult life spent chasing the unimportant things and always postponing the things that matter, why is it that when someone tells us that your neighbour has got a promotion, is being sent on-site, has won a lottery, or is very happily married, why the first tinge of emotion that we feel is that of envy, and the first thing we tend to do is give excuses for the success for that person, and very very seldom does it lead to a first tinge of happiness or pride. Why are we becoming so hollow today? I believe it is because we no longer have a higher purpose, unlike 60 years ago. We are lost in the crowd of meaninglessness, trying to grab at everything that comes our way. To find true happiness, there needs to be a greater meaning to life. 

When we volunteered for Retina India, we were asked what purpose does it serve, how would you gain from being a part of it, some even went so far as to ask: “Will you get a CV point for this?” The only reason I personally did it was because I always felt that itch. That itch to give something back to the society. That itch that comes from the guilt that I feel deep down when I see a beggar on the road, or lower class people trying to just make ends meet. I feel blessed, and I feel guilty. I feel this is my way to taking that first step towards doing something that really matters. It is my way of stepping out of the mundane and taking up something with a higher purpose. I hope some of this resonates with each one of you. Think about it. Thank you."

More Than Words

I pull the cloth curtain and look outside. It is one of those days when the morning air strikes up a magical mixture between the frowning cold and the eager sunshine. Full of promises, it diffuses in you a sense of optimism that is unmatchable under ordinary circumstances. The old building running up the hill tells me that the village is near. As informed, it was indeed not very far away from SIBM Pune’s Lavale campus. 

I see a board which has Nande written onto it in wide alphabets. This is our cue as even the bus starts to slow down. A look to my right tells me that we have reached the school. The big blue steel banner, painted in white with the name of the school stares at us. I feel the familiar smell of uncertainty engulf me. Fact – I have never taught school kids, especially in a school. The thought of teaching students of Class 7^th was, I admit, a bit intimidating, just because it was the unknown till this moment. The same churning of emotion in the bellies was reflected on the faces of a lot of my batch-mates who had also volunteered for teaching students through this initiative Prerna made possible by Social Entrepreneurship and Consulting Cell (SECC) of SIBM Pune.   

As we walked into the school, staying close together for comfort, we saw a recess underway. Students, big and small, were playing football, badminton with racquets and plastic table tennis bats, cricket with and without bats, a bunch of 5 girls playing train-train, circuitously finding their way through the crowd. It reminded me of the melange of games and sports that we used to play in the field during our school days where a football used to hit a batsman ready to face a ball by a bowler who is waiting for the pitch to get clear because younger students are running all over it running after a small bright-yellow plastic ball, which for a moment gets mixed up with another similar bright-yellow plastic ball thrown by a student who is playing throw-throw, a game which included throwing and catching a ball in turn by two teams standing on opposite ends of the ground – in short, a microcosm of the rich playful energy of all kinds that is epitomized by children across barriers of race, community, religion and nation.   

The bell was sounded and the students were called in to their classes. When we reached just outside the classroom, a student with a black monkey-cap on the head ran up to us and gave us a mango-bite each. We were told by his sidekick, who always seemed to accompany him, that it was his birthday today. Then they ran into the classrooms. As we entered the rooms cautiously, the first thing I noticed was that the boys and girls were sitting separately – the girls on two rows on the left of the class and the boys on one row towards the right. I reminded myself that this was the rule and not the exception. We were faced by an eager looking bunch of around thirty kids, who got up instantaneously and started singing in unison a “welcome teacher” jingle, which was obviously taught to them, and which nostalgically reminded me of the “gooood moorrrniiiinnnggg siirrrr”, the elongated wish which was the established norm in school, universally replicated in each and every class room. 

After preliminary instructions, we started by teaching them basic introductions in English like “I am a student”, “You are teachers”, “We/they are students” etc. Initially we tried addressing the class as a whole, but seeing that we teachers did not seem like strict disciplinarians, the boys, who interestingly formed just 1/3^rd of the class, started chatting amongst themselves. So after a basic address to the whole class, we started roaming about in the class, asking the girls and the boys to individually recite the conversation starters to each other and we went about correcting individual mistakes.

 Some students were eager to perform – especially one girl whose body language was very confident. Whenever we asked anyone to come up to the front of the class, she looked at any girl sitting around her and tilted her head as if to say “Hey come on! Let’s do it!” Then there were others – a smallish girl sitting on the front bench, who was so shy that when we asked her to recite a sentence, she looked shyly at their partner and hid her head behind her, laughing uncontrollably. 

The most difficult part was to get the boys and the girls to perform a group activity together. The boys seemed shyer at this than the girls. It was tough to get them to do an introduction round together. The girls seemed pretty okay with it, but utter shyness made the boys bend, twist and loll their bodies in impossible ways. Also, when we asked the boys to write a couple of sentence “He is _____” and “She is _____”, they completed the first sentence, but for the second, did not write a name. One of them, hiding the sentence on his notebook with both his hands and with a wide grin on his face, said he will write the girl’s name later. 

After about an hour, we were asked to let them have a break of about 10 minutes. That was it – there was no looking back. Afterwards, when we tried to get them back in the classrooms, we were told that once they are let out to play again, it’s very difficult to discipline them again to go back in. So we gave up trying. Moreover, today being a Saturday, we could not see a single teacher around. So the students were in their full gaiety and merriment. 

One thing that was difficult to miss was the difference between the 7^th Class girls and the rest of the school students. The “senior” girls reflected discipline, standing in line waiting for their chance to play badminton, curious faces affected with the burden of imminent adulthood, disciplined by their mothers not to mingle much with boys, and looking responsible far beyond their years. The rest of the kids looked like a mish-mash of fun, playfulness and frolic, what with their unique game of jumping upon the teachers, trying to hang from them like one would from a branch of a tree, all at the same time. 

Soon it was time to leave. There were endearing kids that came to us and said good bye, requesting us to come again “tomorrow”. To the responsible and mature ones, we told that tomorrow would not be a possibility, but another time in the next week could happen. I also asked the SECC guys to organize something before our mega-fest Transcend begins next weekend. We had tea and vada-pav, which each one agreed were far better than what we got in our university canteen. May be it was the delicious taste of self-satisfaction. 

Nande opened my eyes to the extremely poor quality of education in government schools in rural areas. Also the lack of teachers and funding, social inhibitions and absence of fruitful ways of making students learn stifle the creative in each one of them. What they need is an effort to go beyond rote learning, to learn more than just words. Nonetheless, their spirit to learn and their sprightly enthusiasm floored me and it gives me hope. Hope that there is enough want but only lack of availability. Hope that if persistent efforts are made, a change can be brought about. And this is where the true India begins. It is time the politicians leave their ivory towers of discussions, speculation and suggestions and get down to some real work.     

The Glass Ceiling

Interpret the picture with respect to the theme "The Glass Ceiling"

Riju Dutta and Pranay Gupta

Human beings have a history of making promises, cosmetic guidelines for us to follow. There’s a huge hue and cry, teams are brought together, there is talk of change, empowered winds of change can be felt all around. There’s brainstorming, neatly dressed Ivy League graduates bring out ideas, and there’s a fragrance of change. But the day ends, everyone disperses and all that remains are new rules, reams of paperwork and a comfortably forgotten but burning issue. Glass Ceiling. It represents the disempowered thoughts shackled to the prejudices of yesterday. It represents forgotten ideals, ignored responsibilities and hypocritical ramblings. It represents us, and our actions that fail to live up to our words and promises. We talk of change in the workplace, in the world around us – change for the minorities, for women and the marginalized, but the actual changes are only minimally brought about. It’s time to accept responsibility and be personally involved to be a part of the change. It’s time to act.

The picture is a microcosmic representation of the minority and women presence in an organization of today. The Glass Ceiling is represented by the limits within which such rich amount of ideas and experiences are forced to operate. The everyday innovation in thought and in human capabilities is bounded by the man-made but invisible barriers to change. On having a closer look, it can be seen that the growth, rather the mere presence in an organization of women has been skewed. There is a greater number of women willing and able to be a part of the organization in the initial years. This changes with time because of familial roles and maternal responsibilities that a women encounters eventually. This leads to a gender imbalance. The lower end of the room can be interpreted as representing the beginning of a woman’s life in an organization. The number of women can be seen to be decreasing as the years pass by. This not only leads to a loss of gender parity but the diversity of view-points and thoughts that strengthen an organization get lost with the passage of time. The thoughts are not able to diffuse through the organization’s work culture. But there is hope. The bigger blocks represent the trailblazers, the mavericks, the leaders among not only the women, but also other minorities. They can be the torchbearers, the role models of the minorities, representing their cause and leading the way.

Diversity of actions emanates from diversity in people and their thoughts. Change is the order of the day. The question that today’s organizations face is whether the change needs to be top-down – a CEO lady leading the way and giving impetus to change, or bottom-up – broader recruitment initiatives, fostering a culture for gender diversity and policy action. The challenge is to bring about a change within specific domains which have not been considered to be a women bastion, like sales. Other suggestions include flexi-working hours, liberal paternity leaves and coaching, mentorship, sponsorship, and an improvement in social infrastructure. And most importantly, a change in attitudes is important, and it is time to walk to talk. Diversity is a given, but making it inclusive is important. Getting everyone aligned to the whole idea resulting in a cohesive spirit throughout the organization is the challenge.

SIBM Pune GD-PI Experience 2011

These are some of the questions are recently answered for an online site similar to PagalGuy. I am posting them here too. I shall be more than happy if it helps someone. Cheers!

 

   1. How is the GD- PI process structured at SIBM Pune? Can you share your experience?

The GD-PI structure at SIBM Pune consists of four legs. In the first part, we are shown an advertisement which we have to assess, dissect and give our views about. It tests the creative, marketing and interpretive side of us. We were shown an advertisement of Camlin Markers which had an element of humour in it. The second part of it is a Group Discussion. A contemporary topic, mostly from the national news domain, is given and you have to discuss on it with a group of 8 people for 10-15 minutes. Then with the same group and the same panel, you discuss a case study for the same amount of time. The case in our case was a general case study, which had the usual clash between ethics and performance. It was a non-organizational case study and we had a healthy discussion. The final leg included the interview which, in my case, was led by a panel of 2. Both seemed elderly and very polite. They made me feel at ease and the interview was not at all stressing. But then people with so much experience have a way to find out what they are looking for at the exact moment when you feel relaxed. They had my Annexure in front of them and they had already gone through it. The moment I saw their faces, I knew that half the job was already done. So for SIBM Pune, work hard on your Annexure. 

   2. What are the best sources to prepare for the SIBM Pune GD-PI?

For the Group Discussion, you need not prepare by picking up a current affairs book or something. It can be done by diligent reading of the newspapers of the last 3-4 months. Basically you need to be aware of all the big 5-6 news doing the rounds. And for each one you need to have a few arguments, either for or against. That will sail you through the GD. As far as the PI is concerned, you basically need to be thorough with the Annexure that you were asked to submit when you got a call. My Annexure can be read at http://pranay-joiedevivre.blogspot.com/2011/02/annexure-that-got-me-through-sibm-pune.html

 

   3. What are the characteristics that the panel look for in a candidate?

They basically look for the right learning attitude (40%), skills and ability (20%), interests and background (20%) and creativity and ability to think on your feet (20%). Remember, they do not expect much from you, as you will be groomed by SIBM in these two years anyway. All they want to see is a clarity of thought, and if you are mature enough to be in a b-school or not. If they do not feel so, they might think that you need some work experience before joining an MBA course. And honestly, it's much more learning if you have come with atleast a bit of work experience. But that is a separate issue. 

   4. Tips and Advice that you would like to give students?

Be aware of what is happening around you, watch debates (The Big Fight, We the People) on NDTV.com, watch TED talks, inculcate a habit to read articles from Economist, Tehelka, Frontline and Harvard Business Review, apart from the usually suggested Economic Times and The Hindu. Read a lot during this preparation, anything and everything you can get your hands on. Make up your mind about the specialization you want to choose by reading more about related careers on the net, on blogs or by talking to seniors who are in B-schools or have passed out from them. Read books, listen to good music. Make a list of the books and music artists and interests that you want to talk about in your interview. Do an inside-out research about them, because it happens that we have read a book or seen a movie a number of months ago for us to remember the nuances about the characters. So, it’s better to refresh those memories.

Words

Unhinged in the rush of semantics,

Deeper into words I climb,

Feeling my mind unclasp,

From the exasperating rituals of days unbound.

Blinded by the darkness in the character,

Sullied by the dirt sublime,

My soul gropes for the scattered reasons,

Tasting the numbness of time.

Oh my! It’s six already, hours passed by in a daze,

In the unreal human lie which I now faintly perceive,

Let me fly, the literature unshackle my soul,

This is the only life I want to breathe.