Some crimes deserve a thoughtful punishment

Finally the 16th December rape case verdict of the innocent young girl "Nirbhaya" is out and its none other than capital punishment for the 4 barbaric animals. As the furore about this specific case abates and therefore I took some time to reflect back of what we achieved out of it? Is their a lesson we as a society learned? Is their a message of fear being sent out of this judgement? In hindsight, these are some of the questions that we should now think and search for answers! Let me share my views on these thoughts.

Firstly, What we did achieve out of it is: Their is a nation / society wide recognition of crime against women. This sort of anger was never visible on such a large scale. At least this incident has shaken us bottom-up and made us realize that it can happen to our sisters, mothers and wife.

Secondly, about the message of fear: I doubt if it has gone (un) intended sense because rapes keep happening (today's being latest of a 5 year old in Bangalore) at almost the same pace. The problem is the tardy pace of trials that happens within the current judicial system and not with the laws i.e. the problem is not with the medicine but in administering the medicine. We have had 40+ times more capital punishment cases for murders but murders haven't stopped and neither will rapes, like this.

What I feel is that "Nirbhaya" was a too important of a crises to be wasted without learning the lessons and actionizing them but we seem to have done precisely that.The need of the hour was to conduct a nation wide campaign to make women aware of the right for speedy justice in such crimes and whom/how they can approach in case such a thing (god forbid) happens to them, what are the point of contact, whom to escalate in terms of govt. machinery, politicians, media and all the channels but WE HAVE LOST THIS CHANCE.

I feel sad about this state of affairs. We keep fighting about petty comments made about religion but no one says a word when ADB provides advisory to its women delegates about Indian men getting provoked seeing bare legs in the capital of the country. Isn't this shameful for us that an international body while holding conference in India issues such an advisory? Isn't it a sorry state of affairs for women in a country where we worship them in the form of Goddess Durga and Goddess Saraswati ?

Before I finish, let me share a thought what I heard from my mother on Friday (the day the verdict was out). She wanted to celebrate the hanging of the 4 men (#NameAndShame) who got death sentence to which I objected and made her understand that human life is sacred and killings need not be celebrated.

Friends, lets get serious and not be in a rush of blood. Lets not get the anger abated which aroused out of this tragic deliberate crime committed in capital of the country and do our bit. Lets make this incident count.

May Nirbhaya rest in peace.

Upcoming Lok Sabha Elections 2014 (hopefully) and India's Principal Opposition Party

Off late, may be in the last 3 months, I have observed a noticeable change in what I believed to be a person who vowed for growth and governance: Mr. NaMo and his close aides seem to be making a conscious attempt to again play the age old religious card about building temples etc. Sir, we need schools and hospitals rather than temples.

I wish Mr. NaMo could continue his earlier agenda about growth and believe in it. In my opinion, it would be a win in itself to loose on that agenda rather than winning it the other way round. It is high time the people of our country get the kind of governance they need, the kind of healthcare they require and the kind of education deserve!

I wish the GliMPse I saw some time back in Bihar where a bandh was called (I don't support it in any form) on economic affairs and not the one like it was called today to protest against the blasts which happened in bodhgaya.

I Wish if the upcoming elections henceforth are contested on growth and governance 'n' not of religion and rhetorism.

#Jai Hind

P.S.: View expressed here are personal.

A mandatory wave of change in Indian IT Industry

All of us would agree to an observation that the way business is being carried out has evolved in the past decade. Be it the effect of usage of information technology in aspects such as automation, integration, e-commerce or the effect of social media in our lives, the entire ecosystem is evolving. As a customer we expect better services & products and this is at the heart of this change. For the next five minutes, I present my view and analysis of this change on Indian IT industry.

For Indian IT Industry, the decade of 1999 to 2000 was largely marked as evolving of offshore-onshore global delivery model (read-in as the capability to deliver & capacity to scale and reap benefits of cost arbitrage). The next decade (2000 – 2010) efforts of the Indian IT majors were aligned towards the managed services model. Undoubtedly the last two decades turned out to be very profitable both in terms of revenues as well as reputation. In my opinion, all this happened due to an opportunity that was identified, benefits which were marketed well and human resources which were groomed towards a goal and leadership which had vision for next decades.

But as someone rightly said, “you can’t survive on your past glory for a long time”. This is now applicable to tier-1 IT companies to spot new wave for the next decade, reinvent their DNA and move up the value chain. The success from the last two decades has enabled (rather insured to an extent) tier-1 companies for free cash flow which is always required for an organization’s survival. I am sure that their existing business is going to be a lifeline for considerable time or rather a cash-cow as it’s taught in B-schools. Without any iota of doubt, this has been well understood and being worked upon. However the bigger (yaksh) question is, “had we discovered the idea and corresponding strategy to mobilize the idea?” In my opinion, most of the tier-1 IT companies were in self denial mode about the idea until it become inevitable. Nevertheless the workings have started but some players seem to be getting it wrong in terms of execution.

Time, experience and analysis has reinforced my belief that how important is it to identify and empower a leader for a team. As I write this article, I see helplessly a strategy being identified but being implemented in a very bizarre way. I have always wondered why these people in top management deliberately engage some people which they themselves know aren’t fit for the very purpose they are putting in so much time and effort. Guess they are beyond business and logical reasons and might be I’ll never understand that. May be I don’t want to !