Professional attitude and work ethics – a notorious example

The present Indian government came to power on the plank of one of it’s biggest electoral promises, to bring Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to the country. An year on and nothing seems to be materialising on this front. Countries seem to show interest in investing in India everytime the PM is out on his whirlwind world tour, but when it comes to injecting money into India’s economy and infrastructure, all are reluctant. The irony is, even Indian multinational companies share the same reluctance as foreign companies when it comes to investing in India. The bureaucratic redtape in the Indian public sector is quite notorious across the world by now, but where does it stem from? It is not just about corruption as everyone tends to think.

I did my engineering course in a government managed college in my state. A visit to the college office to get something done would reveal everything that is wrong with Indian public sector. Employees amble into the office by 10 in the morning, their body language clearly indicating how they wish another dreadful day would pass by quickly. The disdain towards work is plain visible on their faces and would get amplified the moment they see students waiting for them to arrive. If they are a few minutes early, they will spend time gossiping with one another. At 10 they walk to their desks and start putting things in order. Suddenly they will get up and walk to get some files and along with that they keep asking where is the tea and the snacks. By 10:15, tea is served and they disappear for the next 30 minutes. So they actually start working by 10:45. Then the usual walking around in between when tending to student requests and the gossiping sessions continue. At the stroke of 12 they start checking their watches. Lunch time is on. By 12:30, they start sending back students. Come back at 2. When students go back at 2, the boredom on the people’s faces is more pronounced. By 3, they are asking for tea and snack. Tea is served by 3:15. They disappear again for 30 minutes. Back at 3:45. By 4:45 they are winding up for the day. Add to all of this, their strategy to send students from one desk to another looking for information, refusing to own up any responsibility. Then, if someone in the office who has some information is on leave, they send the student back asking them to come and check the next day if the person is back in office. This is a usual day in most government offices. Here is one example (http://www.deccanchronicle.com/150823/nation-current-affairs/article/telangana-tries-instil-discipline-staff)

When my colleagues and I went to Netherlands, someone was there to pick us up and drive to the apartment we were going to stay in. It was a Friday, so what I thought was I will have to go to the government office on Monday to complete my visa formalities. But instead of taking us to the apartment, we were whisked away straight to the government office. I was flabbergasted. What about keeping my bags in the apartment and freshening up before going? None of that was happening. All formalities were completed by noon and we were told that we would get back our passports in 10 days. Big deal, I thought. Government procedures never get completed on time in India. 10th day, I get a letter from the post office. My passport was delivered at my apartment, I was not there so it is being held at the nearest post office. I realized one thing that day. Government sector can also function so efficiently. Bad attitude towards work is something we breed in ourselves and then pass it on to others.

This takes me to the concept of privatization of public sector functions. It is often said that privatization increases efficiency and people work harder and longer. They also get paid much better than in the public sector. But privatization also increases the overhead on individuals. We will be charged more for the same services when being offered by private companies. So what is happening is, people in public sector offices don’t work, government runs into losses and turns it over to private companies and private companies generate profits by charging more from us. Then what does this imply? Money negates bad work attitude of people? So does this suggest that I can walk into my college office with a wad of currency notes and get a certificate I need in a day which would normally take 3 days? Then privatization = taking bribe. If taking bribe is a crime, so is privatization.
I have heard many people saying that they want to join the public sector because they want to live a life in peace. So there is already the perception that people can earn money and live a happy life in public sector jobs without having to work hard. I find this extremely weird. People elect governments for the growth and betterment of the country, government conducts exams and selection processes to appoint the same people to work in government jobs and the same people do not want to work hard? Then why elect governments at all? This is a vile and vicious loop that is playing a huge role in hindering the progress of the country.

When we talk about investing in business, what are actually talking about? Are we talking about the idea, the product or service, the infrastructure? What are we investing in? We are investing in people because no business would exist without people. So when the government laments about the lack of FDI investments, they should first look at people and understand that the underlying factor is bad attitude of people towards work. How do they change this? First of all, remove the perception that working in public sector is professional honeymoon. Rather than privatizing, government should consider hiring tough taskmasters from the private sector and make them run the show. There are steps that government can take but ultimately even the government is made by the people for the people. As long as this pathetic attitude towards work exists in the country, no government is going to be able to cajole the world to trust us enough to invest in us.

Alleviating the trauma of speaking in English

English, probably the most intriguing language in the world. Quirky, yet nightmarish. One word can have multiple meanings based on context and even a comma or a semicolon can turn the intent of a sentence upside down. Even then, unofficially the language of our planet. According to Trevor Noah, a superlative comedian from South Africa, English is the best outcome of British colonization done right. His laugh riot on the British and English is worth listening to. Plenty has already been written in English and about English, yet when it comes to speaking in English, people go through brain freeze and paralysis especially in India.

India became a hub for outsourcing, especially in IT primarily because of our skills in English. Educated from schools in English as the primary medium of language in the British system of education, we are ideally expected to breeze through anything in English, be it in writing or talking. The best part is, even students who learn subjects in their mother tongue in schools pick up English and start writing well in no time. So the question is, if we can write in English why can’t we speak in English? What I find ridiculous is, a thriving business environment exists in the name of teaching people how to speak English. Why would anyone have to “learn” to speak in English when they are already good in writing in English? There was a time when the BPO industry had started to flourish in India and there was a massive demand to speak English the American way so that BPO employees can speak to clients in the US.  I met a couple of people who were working in BPO companies and was left bewildered. These people must have had reasonably good English speaking skills before they were trained to speak in American accent. Why would anyone want to lose their natural speaking ability just to earn some money? Then came a time when I was part of a training program for improving communication with clients and we were advised to speak English without accent. Made perfect sense to me.

So what is holding us back from speaking in English? We grow up listening to our mother tongue language at home and that language becomes the easiest way to express our needs and emotions, just like kids who are born in homes where English is the mother tongue language would learn to express themselves in English. Even in schools where children are forced to converse in English with each other and with teachers, they would relapse quietly into their mother tongue language in their personal space. One simple example is, watch yourself as you count a bunch of currency notes. Do you count in English or your mother tongue language by default? The problem rears it’s head only when we enter a professional work environment. The first reason why speaking in English becomes tough is, we are thinking what to say or respond to questions in our mother tongue language and translate that directly into English when speaking. So thinking in one language and speaking it out in another language will never work, it will only stifle and stunt our conversational ability. I had a colleague who was working as a Dutch translator. The documents she was translating always used to have some words that had no direct translation to English words. I used to tell her to interpret the meaning or intent of the entire sentence in Dutch and then frame the sentence in English. This was something I came across when I was in the Netherlands. My Dutch colleagues would suddenly stop talking in between and start thinking. I quickly realized that they were searching for words that were English equivalents of Dutch words they were framing in their minds. This is far more pronounced in China.

The second reason is more stark and visible. We all have this inherent need to drive every conversation we have in the way we want it to go, even meaningful discussions and friendly banters. Job interviews are the best example. The first thing that the interviewer and the candidate will try to do implicitly is to take control of the flow of conversation. I know many cases where people who are skilled in their jobs are not really good communicators and are short on confidence because of this, so when they are being interviewed by people whose English is better according to their perception, they start trying to mimic the speed at which the interviewer is speaking. Thinking and analyzing in the mother tongue language, translating that into English, trying to match someone else’s rate of speech, all of this together can become an excellent recipe for disaster.

There is a problem with the educational system as well. Too much emphasis is laid out on grammar which prepares people to write well but does not guarantee to make them good speakers or good communicators. I don’t know anything more than what a noun and a verb is. I couldn’t wrap my brain around anything else in grammar. Then I realized that as long as I am able to frame sentences correctly while speaking and writing, I am good to go. The gap between the education sector and employment sector is widening now. There was a time when educated people were less so the employment sector was ready to take them in and train them in the aspects of effective communication. With the rapid advances in technology, availability of internet and an exploding number of qualified candidates available in the job market, companies do not have to bother anymore to train people to communicate well. This is one reason why we see unemployment rising among fresh graduates.

So, how do we overcome our draconian fear of speaking English? By speaking English. Simple. But primary to that and of utmost importance is to realize that no one in the world is perfect in English. The proof of this is, no one gets a perfect score in any English language exam. If we listen to David Lloyd or Geoffrey Boycott (both are cricket commentators from England) or the way some of the Afro-Americans speak, we won’t even know at first if they are speaking English at all. English, without the influence of an accent will be very hard to find, anywhere in the world. I was working on a project for a Norwegian client a few years back and there was an urgent task that had to be done at 5 am IST which meant 1:30 am local time in Norway. We had to call up someone at the client’s office to inform about the task and get his approval. The way he used to speak English during normal hours was in itself hard to understand and what he mumbled in his sleep none of us in the team could figure out. So contrary to popular perception, Indians speak much better English and can improve significantly if we consciously work on reducing the effect of our mother tongue language on our English. So in a nutshell, to become proficient in speaking English,

1) Start speaking in English, especially in professional environments. Do not develop the habit of keeping company with only those colleagues who belong to our own state/city or with whom we share our mother tongue language.

2) Do not get bogged down by anybody’s expertise in English. Rather, take it as a challenge and focus on improving our own expertise in English.

3) Work towards eliminating our default method of thinking and analyzing in mother tongue language and trying to translate that into English during speaking. Start thinking in English, frame the sentences in our mind and then speak.

4) Do not get worried about how fast someone is speaking English and if that person is trying to control the conversation. Think well, form the sentences and speak slowly. The objective is to present our opinion or give an answer with maximum clarity.

5) Work diligently and consciously on reducing the influence of our mother tongue language from the way we speak English. Do not try to ape anyone’s way of speaking. Be unique in the way we speak and express ourselves. It will help us in creating distinct personalities as well.

All the brouhaha over an execution

The last rites of two men were conducted on Thursday. Both were Muslims. The commonality ends there. One was a renowned scientist and ex-President of India who lived his life without a blemish on his sleeve. The other was charged with terrorism against his country. One was glorified the other was vilified. The point to note here is, there isn’t much to talk about the glorified one but discussions are still raging about the vilified one. I know the case of a recently deceased and highly respected doctor and his nymphomanic wife. All discussions are centred around the wife in the neighborhood and among people who know about them. No one hardly appreciated the doctor when he was alive and no one remembers him fondly after death. This is one highlight of the age of Kali and it has been described clearly in ancient Indian texts, that being good will have no value in society.

Coming back to the point of the debates on the vilified one, Yakub Memon, who was executed for his role in the Mumbai blasts in 1993. I have never taken any interest in those blasts, the reasons behind them and the consequences. The blasts were the result of the fallout of the Babri Masjid (mosque) demolition in 1992. I have always looked the other way whenever an issue related to politics or religion comes up. Now that I am seeing so many debates and so much information is coming out, its my feeling that the discussions and debates are being done at a very superficial level. The central and state governments at that time stood silently and watched the mosque being brought down effectively giving rise to Hindu fundamentalism, the pretext being it is necessary to counter Islamic fundamentalism. Well, Islam is a religion that has it’s history written in blood and violence. It has followed the policies of war and population increase to expand it’s base. Genghis Khan is an example of this. If we take the Muslim population of the world as a whole, only a few percentage of people have the fundamentalist attitude. Let’s admit it, all of us have Muslim friends and when we talk to them, are we secretly analyzing them to see if they are fundamentalists or jihadis? My mind is not that demented. So to counter any fundamentalism, do we need good governance, effective policing, the right approach to integrating them into the society with education and by winning their confidence or we should give rise to another fundamentalism? Fight fire with fire? An eye for an eye will only leave both blind.

Yakub Memon returned to India and it was the evidence that he gave against his brother Tiger Memon and Dawood Ibrahim that helped Indian authorities to eventually crack the case. Now that Yakub was made a conspirator for the blasts and executed, we need to look at several things. Why didn’t he stay away from India like his brother and Dawood and escape from being prosecuted? Maybe he wanted redemption, that’s why he came back. He was incarcerated in jail for 20 years and a lot of it in solitary confinement. In India, lifetime imprisonment is for 14 years so he had served a lot more punishment than he had to. Now, a prison is not just a place to lock up criminals. If that was the case, it would drain a large part of any country’s revenue. A prison is a place for reform, to give people with criminalistic past a chance to redeem themselves so that they can be reintegrated back into the society once they serve their time. Not all criminals get reformed anyways. Yakub was a chartered accountant and it takes intelligence, ability and the desire to crack extremely tough exams to earn the degree. It is hard to believe that someone who had worked so hard at the academic level would ditch all those efforts to take the lives of innocent people. Yes, there are Muslims who are doing that, the ones who are being radicalised in extremist Islamic principles. Yakub was not a Jihadi. If he was himself seeking redemption there was no threat to the country if he was kept alive. Then why was he executed?

I believe the rabbit hole goes a lot more deeper. We never know where the dividing lines blur, especially when it is between good and bad and religion and politics. There is a rumour that Dawood’s passport gets renewed in India every 5 years. I don’t know how far it is true, but it is common knowledge that Bollywood is bankrolled by the underworld and all actors dance at the whim and fancy of underworld dons including Dawood. How difficult would it be for the underworld to invest in India’s markets? No trail of it would exist, especially the trail that leads from the political class to the underworld. We no longer know what is a genuine act of terrorism and what was orchestrated, especially after extremely damning reports are emerging about 9/11 and Indian government’s funding for separatists in Kashmir. If Yakub’s sentence had been commuted to life imprisonment, he would have been due to be released from prison immediately. Who knows, maybe there was a trail from Yakub that could have gone to places and people where it should never go, so it was necessary to eliminate him?

I have asked myself a question several times over the years especially when I was in Bangalore. How difficult is it to set off bomb blasts in multiple IT campuses in the city? Security is so lax, employees could easily take the components of a bomb inside and assemble it to set it off. Indian security mechanism is neither too stringent nor strong enough to detect such random devious plans in advance. There was a terrorist threat in the city when I was there and I called up my parents to tell them that if there is a bullet or bomb meant for me somewhere, it will come for me so no point worrying about it. I have often wondered, if the entire Muslim community in India is disgruntled, how difficult would it be for them to destroy the country from within? Then why is it not happening? Because they are not and whatever trouble we see is being fomented by forces that have their own objectives to fulfill at the expense of human lives. If we walk randomly across India and see how many Hindus are fighting with Muslims right now, I am sure the answer would be zero.

Anyone who takes the lives of innocent people in any way should be punished and I will not give any flimsy reasons to oppose that. If the Indian government is so keen on handing out retributions to perpetuators of the bomb blasts in Mumbai, why can’t they seek the help of Interpol or use any covert methods to capture Dawood and Tiger Memon, bring them back to India and hang them? Mossad used to do that to capture Nazi officers and soldiers hiding around the world after WWII. That is what sounds credible. I keep seeing one of victims of the bomb blasts on news debates glorifying Yakub’s execution as a sort of retribution for him. Random people pulled down a religious place hurting the sentiments of people while the government did nothing to stop it and retribution from random people took the lives of random people. I am wondering why this man is not seeking retribution from the government that he elected and had failed him. There are Hindus indicted on terrorism charges and convicted but who are out on bail and are roaming around freely. Why this impartial treatment? So the point here is, as long as the system needs these people, they are safe. Once the need is over, they will be eliminated. Osama Bin Laden is a case in point. He was a valuable asset for the US at one time and was even photographed walking out of CIA’s office. We know what happened to him eventually though I have my doubts if he was executed at all as was claimed.

Debates have turned to whether execution as capital punishment should be abolished in India. Five men who mercilessly raped a woman in a moving bus, inserted iron rod in her private parts and left her naked to die on the street at midnight are still alive in prison. They should be tied to stakes and burned alive. That should be the punishment for any man who forgets that he was born from a woman’s womb and is out to rape and abuse women. It was the so called “rarest of rare cases” as the Indian judiciary likes to describe some cases, then why haven’t they been hanged yet? The entire Indian system is so mired in corruption and deceit that it needs to be overhauled and the constitution itself needs a makeover. The botched treatment of Yakub’s case will have it’s fallouts and it remains to be seen how deep it will go. It is better off that we keep reminding ourselves one thing. There will be no peace as long as blood is being spilled and retribution will follow.