This and That - October23

 

Sometimes more than one event sets off a chain of thoughts, and so this is a short commentary on different topics.

G20:

Undoubtedly this was the highlight of the year. 100+ events were held across 41 cities in India over a year long period, 220+ meetings were held across 60 cities. The sheer breadth and scale of the arrangements which occupied the entire year involved 15 million Indians in some form of activity. Many have griped about making this as a personality cult, waste of money etc.

They could not be more wrong because this year long event had a huge benefit which nobody likes to talk about – the MARKETING of India. Every visitor would have had experiences and hopefully the good would have been more in number. But every visitor – as representatives of their countries across various segments – would have noted the arrangements, planning, efficiency, culture, people,  and the scale at which this was held. Many would go back with admiration for Indian capabilities and this message would be spread across their circles. The image of brand India would go way up and ultimately, THAT is what matters. For too long poverty tourism and the land of snakes, elephants were what India was known for. In my global travels across my career, just in the last 15 years, I have seen the change – from discussing about snakes & poverty to discussing Indian capabilities.

This journey has been avoidably long and at least now a beginning has been made. How far we as a nation build upon this, is up to us and our political leadership going forward. If people talked of a Personality cult, then as someone in Business I can say that the PM or President of any nation is its biggest Brand ambassador and star advertising campaigner – whoever it is. Just as a successful group is known by the face that represents it, a nation needs to be marketed and the PM has done just that. This was not some Khan, Amitabh or Kapoor paid for being a brand ambassador for the nation and we know what happened the last time we did that.  PM Modi has been the star salesman and marketing lead and he did that job with aplomb.

The marketing value of this event can be gauged by the fact, as publicly acknowledged by many – the joint declaration hitherto escaping every meeting was made possible because other nations had a stake in India rather than India going to them with a begging bowl. That stake made nations ready to tone down and sign off on contentious issues. Forget the politics, it’s the gesture that’s more important.

Ease of Doing Business:

That since 1991, the way business can be done in India has changed hugely is a fact. But India remains a nation most overseas folks still find “Complex” “Difficult” etc while the same folks find comfort in a China. Leaving aside the lure of money, one would think that the Chinese system of government would be less attractive than India which is a democracy with freedom. But no, everybody including the Indians prefer the Chinese. There must be some reason for this.

At the expense of being facetious and exaggerating, more to make a point, anybody wishing to do business anywhere, essentially looks for clarity, vision, and a dispute resolution mechanism – even if the rules are unfairly tough. The dispute resolution works rather well in a China. You can get jailed instantly, killed or whatever and the justice dispensed is instant – never mind if its correct or not. This ensures that everybody treads with fear but runs with caution to not trip on the way. This applies to even the corrupt govt staff however high they maybe and again nobody is questioning the correctness of the punishment.

In India even after an arbitration you go to courts and that takes decades to resolve. No lawyer or expert can ever advise you that what you are doing is correct. A Govt babu if he is determined to fix you, can find a dozen loopholes, that you don’t need to be shot, you will still bleed to death. The way the rules are framed are such that if every line were to be followed in word and spirit India would still be living in 1023 and not 2023. Its all about the interpretation. Look no further than the Vodafone Hutch case.

The Govt itself is the largest litigator and over time the political system has become such that nobody – no party, minister, officer – can ever be wrong or admit “defeat”. The opposition will crucify you. If perchance a govt were to say that the sun rises in the west and is proved wrong, trust me a case will be filed and the case will be fought for decades by the system to prove that the sun does rise in the west. The ego and fear of the opposition saying “scam” is monumental.

While there are no easy answers for this, a mechanism of mediation leveraging retired judges should be made legal where the parties concerned would have the freedom to opt for this, but once opted, cannot back off if they lose a case. Such a system will take time to mature but a beginning must be made. This can be backed by suitable amendments to the law itself.

Being Indian:

I did refer to snakes, elephants earlier. In the end, the image of India, its ability to attract investment, business predominantly depends on each of us Indians who deal with the outside world. Any Govt can only do so much and not more. Each of us as Indians need to promote, sell and market India. That is exactly what I have experienced in China.

A middle east company wanted to buy buses from China. The company’s technical team insisted on the Chinese using certain outsourced items from suppliers they were comfortable with and willing to even pay for the same. Technically these had no impact from any viewpoint. To illustrate, it was like asking the bus supplier to use Tyres locally available in the middle east. The Chinese bus salesman and the entire team of the bus company threw a fit and insisted the client accept a bus with Chinese manufactured subcomponents only. The client was equally adamant.

Finally, the Chinese relented and said that the suppliers of the subcomponents selected by the client must deliver the items to their facility in China. You would think that was easy. But no, the paperwork needed for this was just not possible to be done because the entire system put up a high wall. The order could not be taken up for delivery for 9 months which meant that the middle east client suffered delays in getting their buses. They did not budge but then the Chinese also did not budge.

Much later I was told that if a salesman like this helped ensure that only Chinese products are used, even the suppliers of those parts would reward them.

The question here is – can we even imagine any one of us doing this and being supported by the organisation we work for and then get rewarded by a sub supplier? How many Indian corporates including at the highest levels of management try to sell the entire Indian value chain when pushing their product? Zero and None.

Self-Awareness:

We live in a polarised world. Post the Covid pandemic this divide has only grown. The number of folks who even understand that life is not Black and White but has many shades of grey is becoming lesser. You can’t have a view without it being interpreted from the prism of politics, religion or whatever else convenient. I include myself in this even if I try to avoid this trap.

What I see is that many lack the self-awareness of what they are saying or implying. Many American friends have said – I am a Republican but that doesn’t mean I support Trump. Maybe, but then the moment you vote Republican you are voting Trump if he is the candidate. They at least have that fig leaf cover because Trump may not be the candidate.

But India is different. We don’t have any control over who sits in the most important office of Prime Minister. If we elect a party that decides to put a puppet in that chair, we have no option but to accept that.  The majority party can install a PM who has never won an election and can never win an election to save their life. Technically, the Govt can be openly run from outside by someone who is all powerful with zero accountability and we the people have no choice but to grin and accept that. How often have we heard the phrase of a President or Prime Minister being a mere rubber stamp. This goes all the way down to even Panchayat elections where a wife or mother is installed but the family runs the show just because rules demand a lady candidate. Yet we will lecture about women’s empowerment and such stuff.

The corollary of the American example is where we hear Indians talk about how they disagree with Rahul Gandhi but they believe in the Congress philosophy. Conversely you have folks saying how they admire Narendra Modi but have reservations about the RSS and Hindutva ideology. This simply doesn’t matter in the Indian context. The moment one supports the Congress, you accept what Rahul Gandhi espouses, his views and any amount of hair splitting doesn’t change the reality. The same logic holds good for the views on Modi. Fact is that most vote for Modi and not the BJP/ RSS but to think that somehow the two are separate entities is being delusional. The – I am a Congressman but I disagree with Rahul Gandhi – is actually blasphemy. You will be acted upon and find yourself not even in the doghouse.

But then many love to live in this delusion and will give verbose arguments to create a difference. Doesn’t help. I any day appreciate a chap with courage of conviction who is self-aware on this and either shuts up or defends the opinion they hold. But then the other problem is that to have an opinion that one can defend, one must read, analyse and understand ALL shades of viewpoints to form the opinion. Most of us form opinions based on online media which are driven by algorithms that only show what we like to read and we never hear contrarian views. Else we listen to someone we like and echo their opinion as ours without any research or study.

We live in a 280-character X or a Instagram reel world but expound on issues that demand a 100 pages of study and sadly enough we actually believe that we are very knowledgeable.

Self-awareness did I say?