In which Sanjeev takes on Narayana Murthy..

Wait a minute. Narayana Murthy, whose company has provided thousands of jobs which go to employing the educated youth of India so that they contribute to Indian society and don’t leave for better opportunities abroad, is a blood sucker?! Infosys is I think the first Indian company to be listed on the Nasdaq. A man and company which made India synonymous with IT is a blood sucker?! Wow.
And Sanjeev who has done what?–tried to start a party for 14 years and failed is the shining example to the youth of India.

My guess is that if you have been trying something for 14 years and not succeeded, better give up and try something else.

The assumption that if you have great intentions, others should automatically support you, is naive at the very least.

About the “not one paise spent” complaint, most industrialists have their own pet charity which they contribute to. So what Sanjeev means is not one paise spent on him.

Sanjeev: The problem here is not about who is better – you are NR, the problem here is which has always been with the citizens of Bharat..whats in it for me..because NR has Infosys to back him up which provided employment to educated youth of India, the so called educated ppl will back NR but not back you because you are fighting for a cause that wont help these ppl immediately. If only they put their individualistic thoughts aside and think about our country, that’s when we will a change, until them we just have to fight. I am with you on this and I share the same feeling about all the so called bright ppl of India.

Mr Hariprasad has known the person and Mr murthy gave 20 crores to Bangalore Municipal Corporation, 20 crores for toilets with a promise that he will give more and not one toilet is working. The respective IAS officers wife must have made Diamond sets out of the commission and sandalwood temples with gold enraves to decorate his new Duplex Bunglaws.

I think all Sanjeev was trying to say in his previous article was, ‘practice what you preach’ . So if Murthy wants to sermonise the youth on honesty he needs to make sure he is free of any dishonesty in life. Seems perfectly logical to me.

People are going gaga over how Murthy started Infosys and how he has given employment to the youth. Well, yes he did all that and no one is contesting that in the first place. The thing is, you can provide employment to thousands of youth but you can still be a serial killer (just exaggerating to prove my point). So basically, your virtues don’t absolve you of your sins. And then on top of that you sermonise people on how serial killing is a bad thing to do.

To people making personal comments about the author, all I’d like to say is grow up. Guys like Sanjeev and Shantanu have already done so much for the country through their blogs than you and your family ever will (intended personal remark).

Ek hi ulloo kaafi hai baraad-e-gulistaan karne ko
Yahaan toh har shaakh pe ulloo baitha hai
anjaam-e-gulistaan kya hoga.

Interesting commentary in these posts, knowing/having interacted with both players personally.

After the discussion on FDI in retail section, never thought I would be in agreement with Malavika on anything – but, have to agree 100% with her on this post.

Unthinking hero worship (and the attendant search for a single-shot magic cure to all our problems) is the bane of this country.

Cheers

Patriot

@Vishnu: Let’s get this right! Sanjeev can make “personal” comments on Narayana Murthy, but we shouldn’t make comments on Sanjeev. Wow. Talk about double standards. As one of the few peole who has actually read Sanjeev’s boring book where he tells us for the nth time what we already know, that Nehruvian socialism is defunct, I think I do have the right to call it as I see it.

@Patriot. It is extremely patronizing to call all those who like Murthy as unthinking. Most people do recognize his flaws, yet overlook them because what he has achieved is phenomenal. It is the same reason people admire Gandhi although he slept with his nieces to test his commitment to celibacy.

Hi Sanjeev,

As clear from your writing, all your statements are of ZERO VALUE and they are made of BASELESS FACTS about MrNarayana Murthy.
I work in Infosys and from what I know, will try to answer your question- “icely said, Mr Murthy, but SINCE WHEN HAVE YOU DONE ANYTHING ABOUT INDIA’S PROBLEMS?”

Let me classify the problems a nation like India is facing, and the contribution of Narayana Murthy and the company founded by him:

1) Social problems:
a) Infosys Foundation: have taken care of thousands of genuine cases in the society in need of realy help in field of education, healthcare, financial help.
b) Akshaya Patra: a mid day meal program funded by Infy employees for thousands of school kids across the country.

2) Jobs in society:
a) Company which was started by murthy currently employs nearly 1.5 lakh indians, and it is second largest IT exported in India, first Indian company to be listed in NYSE.

3) Scientific progress in India:
a) Started Infosys Science Foundation which awards Infosys prize (Rs50 lakh for all winners in various fields every year), is like Nobel prize inside India (highest valued award in India)

After taking India into global IT economic map, murthy retired with honor after leading Infy for 30 long years!

With all your failed attempts to just start a political party, how can u even comment badly on a person like mr. murthy who could even be the next President of India ?

@ Kaffir

Well, given the nature of discussion on FDI with Malavika, I built a particular image – that is usually the fallacy of trying to extrapolate based on limited data points. Happy to correct the image, when more data points emerge. In this, my particular hero is Hercule Poirot, whose philosophy was to ensure that the working hypothesis fit all data points, rather than the other way around!

I have not read much Rand and Smith, except their seminal works. But, I have read more of Hayek and continue to do so, along with Von Mises. Their clarity of thought and logic is astonishing. And, if you are a true Hayekian, you can never be intolerant of competing ideas, even if you may not agree with them. Maybe, you should consider shedding your distrust a bit, as well?

@ Harapriya

Sorry, the intent was not to tar everybody with the same brush. But, there is a lot of unthinking hero worship that goes on.

I admire Murthy, Nilekani, Kris, Shibulal & co a lot – they have built something which is truly world class and amazing. The essence of Infosys is that they took a linear, non-scalable business and converted it into a partially non-linear, immensely scalable business. In terms of creativity, I would rank the company along side the likes of Apple, because what they achieved has only been achieved by a handful of companies, globally. And, none of the other global companies have the same return and cash flow ratios as Infosys.

But, Murthy probably does not truly understand what ails India. And, if he does, he does not have the nerve to take corrective action or the hard path to remedial action. Worse, he says things like MMS is a good person, which is contrary to virtually everything that we can *see* today. MMS is personally implicated, at the very least, of sacrificing integrity and honesty for the sake of his UPA government continuing to be in power.

So, what gives? Why does Murthy act in this manner? And, when he does so, outside the umbrella of Infosys, why should he be shielded from criticism?

Cheers

Patriot

Mr.Murthy may have some ‘issues’.

But Sanjeev is a die hard ‘Macaulay’ Bhakta.

What to tell of his ‘lecture’

@K. Harapriya,
“Another area which has plenty of illegal money is real estate. The problem is fairly simple at least in Tamil Nadu. The government valuation of property is often much, much less than the market value. thus people take the government valuation for the stamp duty and take that amount in cheque and remaining in cash which they don’t account. The solution is really simple–raise market valuation to reflect average market value in that area. If people have to pay taxes on market value irrespective of whether they took it as cash or cheque, they would be more inclined to taking it as a cheque i.e. white money.”

Actually, stamp duty for land in AP is fixed by the govt of AP based on the location and not on the price. Recently, I sold some plots in which the the actual price received is mentioned in the registration papers and it had no relation to the stamp duty.

As it is my dad, an advocate gets several cases from middle/lower middle class folks who earned a honest days labor abd bought plot but unable to register because of high stamp duty and which caused lot of trouble later. I think stamp duty must be reduced, as the govt does not provide any services like proper roads or even drainages.

So called Hi tech city, and near by areas do not even have a proper drainage. And the cost of an independent house in a gated community there is as much as that of Silicon Valley’s affluent neighbourhood’s like Cupertino with its excellent schools(free), libraries and parks. Some contrast!

@ Patriot

There are ample evidences that the so called practioners of free market political discourse have also stooped in corruption if one calls it lobbyign or corruption it does not matter. What really does is how policies have an impact on the development of the people! In country like India we are not yet ready to get the free markets theory. The great practioners of the philosophy to an extent being US – see the disparity in the wealth of the people! A country with a population and society as diverese as India wowudl find it difficult to implement the free market theory in its full version!

As for the society beign corrutp – i dont think there is anythign wrong in what i am saying – if you look at all walks and spheres of life on how corruption as deep rooted – to say socalist parties are the root cause or socalist politicians are the cause is a flawed theory and far from real ground situation.

As a political discourse FTI has all the freedom to pursue what it feels like, but India needs a pan India political party which is inclusive for the desired an dcherished goal of us all to be achevived!

@Malavika: My point was that government valuation of property, called the guideline value in TN, reflect market realities to avoid the problem of black money–i.e. unaccounted money. Yes, the guideline value of the government in suburban areas are based on location and other factors. However, location alone doesn’t impact market value. Demand for the particular location does. If government valuation equalled or at least approximated market value, most of the transaction would be in “white” money. Yes, stamp duty, which is a percentage of government value (in TN it is 8% plus 1% registration fee) will increase.

The argument that stamp duty should be reduced because the government doesn’t provide any amenities is specious at best. The tax is on the current market value of land. Since the people are acquiring the land, they have to pay the tax. It is similar to a sales tax–if you buy a car, you pay a tax as a percentage of the car’s market value.

If would be better to argue that we should not pay road taxes, water taxes etc. because we don’t get those amenities.

@K .Harapriya,

There is a fundamental disagreement here and we have to agree to disagree.
I strongly think every citizen should know his/her tax payer money is being spent.

Taxes have historically been paid to the govt(unless colonized) to provide services like roads, law and order, protect borders, provide education(at least primary) and also welfare for its citizens.. Municipal taxes are paid for providing municipal services. And that is how it works in established democracies.

@Shantanu….we only have faith in you…no one else.

Job Creator or “Slave” creator. The White man needed the Educated Indian to do his administrative work and created ICS and Clerks through Macualay. The White man again needed Educated Indian when his machines got automated and how does he support automation- hire the best brains in the world to work for him. “Throw peanuts and you get monkeys. Throw dollars and you get Indians and Chinese”. This was his strategy and he transferred wealth and lifestyle. One whole generation shifted to it, cut their moustaches, changed their names, their accents, the way of dressing and loved free travels abroad and of course green card and citizenship. In the 50’s, one had to marry local girls to get green cards. Now there is no need.

So what has this resulted in- 25 lakh IT jobs and say around 6, no let us take the worst case, 10 times dependent economy on it – 2.5 crores. what is India’s population -120 crores. What did these great IT Guys do for India’s problems- Our roads are dirty, we still do not have adequate power, our crops are dependent on genetically modified seeds from monsanto, our children speak only stupid english. The current generation’s knowledge of history doesnt go beyond the gandhi family. Worst is their lack of basic knowledge of Economics.

In all capitalist countries today, gaps between have’s and have’nots has increased tremendously and so is it in Indis today. No youngster today wants to work in any other field except IT, Banking or Retail. So all other sectors get no workers at all. So we start importing everything from where.

1) Electronics- China, Korea, Japan
2) From Toys to spare parts- China
3) Healthcare- Licensed from USA

Where is an indian company in any of the retail facing fields. Who caused this and why are we so proud of owning a LG or a Samsung HD TV or a Nokia phone or a Hyundai car. The more the wealth, the more the consumption of devices. India’s stupid politicians limited population growth in only one RELIGION. Stupid Idiots. Today, the country with most population is the winner and they never realized it.

These same IT people love a government which wants to kill the federal structure of India by making states worthless. Hence it has NREGA, the food act now, the riot act. USA is collapsing because it did the same thing- public debt and here we are ready to dole out more subsidies to the poor(where are they?)So there is no more need
for mass leaders in states. and because of the vote bank they have, they will perennially rule.

All Countries in World are sunsetting Nuclear Plants but in India, we have a PM who threatens states if they are not set up and who vowed to resign if the nuclear bill wasnt passed. Where were these captains of INDUSTRY then? Why didnt they raise a voice then?

All are same, be it NRN or anyone else. They are capitalists and hence he stopped the National Anthem because the “Phoren” guest will not understand it. His words:
Hear it from the host of the show.

“Indeed we had arranged for five people to sing the anthem. But then we cancelled it as we have foreigners on-board here. They should not be embarrassed while we sing the anthem.”

—– NOW DOES THAT SOUND FAMILIAR.. YES, THATS WHAT OUR EDUCATED INDIANS DID UNDER THE BRITISH. WORE THEIR HATS AND KILLED OUR CULTURE. Why doesnt any educated Indian ever think how a couple of Foreigners could rule India for 300 + 60 Yrs now? It was only because our Educated Indians- all bred in London and all Lawyers wanted them to rule us. Didnt Gandhi Say in Africa and in India that “As Subjects of the British Empire, we should do our duty and help them in War”. Unfortunately, people dont know gandhi beyond the Movie.

As long as our educated people live in this carefully Brainwashed Glut, Sanjeev or Shantanu will remain restless. Kudos Sanjeev and i fully support your view on NRN.

“In all capitalist countries today, gaps between have’s and have’nots has increased tremendously and so is it in Indis today.”

Mahesh, I don’t care about the gap increasing – that seems to be the wrong way to look at it. What matters is whether the standard of living/wage etc. for have-not’s has gone down when compared to 5-10-20 years ago. If you can show this to be true, then it is a cause for concern. But, if the level of both have’s and have-not’s has gone up, the gap between them is irrelevant.

Besides, one would look at the reasons why this gap has increased, instead of simply implying that somehow, it’s the fault of have’s, or that the have-not’s are being exploited.

@Mahesh,
“In all capitalist countries today, gaps between have’s and have’nots has increased tremendously and so is it in Indis today. No youngster today wants to work in any other field except IT, Banking or Retail. So all other sectors get no workers at all. So we start importing everything from where.”

A small correction. Income disparities have become worse and the workers share of GDP(at least in US) has decreased since 70’s in Anglo Saxon countries. But not in Germany, Japan, South Korea. These countries retained their manufacturing base. Good for them.

I don’t blame the IT workers, if the other sectors provide decent income, other sectors would be flooded with aspirants too.

*** COMMENT EDITED ***

“One of them even asked me to consider joining an existing party to which I responded that I have something valuable: self-respect. Something they don’t seem to either have or understand. Their “honesty” means nothing if it doesn’t translate into self-respect.”

that NRN is a commie turned ‘house-brownie’ is a well known fact. But this guy Sanjeev is no better. He is a well known apologist for *** genocider Macaulay and his ilk.