Milind G
Many Indians have succeeded abroad and made a name for themselves and India. We should all be proud of them and their achievements. The most surprising thing is Indians are succeeding abroad where the environment is conducive and friendly unlike India with its outdated policies and laws that interrupt in your activities. They are doing extremely well in USA, UK and other developed countries.
Sometimes it makes one wonder would they be as successful, had they stayed back in India. Our archaic laws, policies and old system generally does not recognise talent or merit nor does it encourage people or businesses to grow. It gets mired in the policies, politicians and officials. But once they go abroad, in a very free and encouraging environment, their talent grows to its real potential and helps them to reach greater heights. Here talent is recognised and nurtured to get the bet out of a person.
Rono Dutta has become head of United Airlines, the biggest airline in the world. Vikram Pandit has become head of Citigroup, which operates Citibank, one of the largest banks in the world. Rana Talwar has become head of Standard Chartered Bank, one of the biggest multi-national banks in Britain, while still in his 40s. Lakhsmi Mittal has become the biggest steel baron in the world, with plants in the US, Kazakhstan, Germany, Mexico, Trinidad and Indonesia. Since India’s socialist policies reserved the domestic steel industry for the public sector; Lakhsmi Mittal went to Indonesia to run his family’s first steel plant there. Subash Chandra of Zee TV has become a global media baron, one of he few to beat Rupert Murdoch. He could never have risen, had he been limited to India with the monopoly of Doordarshan. But with modern technology, satellite TV made it possible for him to target India from Hong Kong. And from here he soared to greater heights.
Very few may have heard about 48-year-old Gururaj Deshpande. His communication company, Sycamore is currently valued at over $30 billion by the US stock market, making him perhaps one of the richest Indians in the world. Arun Netravali has become president of Bell Lab, one of the biggest research and development centres in the world with nearly 30,000 inventions and Nobel Prizes to its credit. Silicon Valley alone has over 100,000 Indian millionaires. Indra Krishnamurthy Nooyi has become CEO of Pepsico Inc in 2006, a Fortune 500 company. Sabeer mehta invented Hotmail and sold it to Microsoft for $400 million. Victor Menezes is number two in Citibank. Shailesh Mehta is CEO of Providian, a top US financial services company. Other Indians occupying top positions include – Rakesh Gangwal of US Air, Jamshed Wadia of Anderson and Aman Mehta of Hong Kong Shanghai Banking Corp. In Washington DC, the Indian CEO High Tech Council has 200 members, all high tech chiefs.
Now the question arises, why do Indians succeed overseas and do not achieve much success in India. The main reason is our archaic policies, lack of transparency and laws not being enforced properly. Another reason is the neta-babu raj, which still raises it head though India is on the road to liberalisation. Indians going abroad find the rule of law in the countries a welcome change, where merit and talent is nurtured and encouraged irrespective of your origin, colour, caste, etc. People have a choice to innovate without being strangled by politicians, manipulators or regulations.
