Thursday, December 24, 2009

In the name of charity!!!

Philanthrocapitalism is being used for personal business!

What is the one thing that is common between Tony Blair, Jet Li, Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, Muhammad Yunus and Sir Richard Branson? In a single word – it is philanthrocapitalism which is bringing a businesslike approach to solve society's problems at global level. Corporate honchos have jumped into this bandwagon to take advantage of this ongoing global spree and straightening their latent purposes. However, a few genuine donors like Gates (who donated $3.8 billion), Jet Li (Jet Li's organisation, One, has already signed up 1 million Chinese to give money), Md Yunus (developed microfinance), Branson (social causes as a profit-making strategy) – to name a few – are taking all the possible initiatives to change the image of corporations and of course helping the society at the same time. A recent survey conducted by the US-based public relations firm, Edelman, discovered that only 38 per cent of people trust enterprises to do what is right and about 17 per cent trust the information they acquire from a company's CEO.

Projects like One Laptop Per Child or Project Shakti, not only helps the poor, but goes a step further and empowers them and promotes community action as well. Besides jobs, health care and housing, the concept of philanthrocapitalism should go further and ensure participation of civil-society on business and not vice versa. But with business and projects getting more complex and diverse, donors also need to strike the right balance. On one hand they ask for enough information to be able to monitor the effectiveness of the organisations they fund, but on the other they do not bog them down in form-filling bureaucracy. True, today most of them are eying on the tax break they receive from their initiatives. Most of them are investing in projects that redirect the money to entrepreneurs in developing countries. Of course, the rise of the philanthrocapitalists does make some people nervous, fearing that these wealthy donors are unaccountable and lack legitimacy. Gates and others certainly need to be transparent and open to challenge. The initiatives have just reduced to marketing gimmicks that enable these entrepreneurs to push their products to even inappropriate demographies.

Philanthrocapitalism is of course shaping the most destituted part of the world and is trying to embrace business opportunity for the upliftment of the society. But then most of the times, the money get channelised to mid-size entrepreneurs in these developing countries (highly perforated with corruption). The big names need to urgently track down the flow of their money and make sure that it reaches the right audience. Otherwise, soon the whole concept of philanthrocapitalism will get written off.
For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Monday, December 14, 2009

Big fat akali wedding

A young politician organised a free-for-all pre-wedding bash

The days of simple marriages are almost over! In the past few decades, politicians across the country have been competing to outdo each other in holding extravagant wedding ceremonies.

A few years back, Rashtriya Janata Dal chief and former railway minister Lalu Prasad Yadav spent millions on his daughter’s wedding. The chief of the AIADMK, Jayalalithaa Jayaram, invited over 100,000 people at her foster son’s wedding party in Tamil Nadu. The sumptuous ceremony became the talk of the town.

Taking a cue from there, a young Akali politician and sitting MLA Bikramjit Singh Majithia organised a free-for-all pre-wedding bash, which was attended by senior politicians including chief minister Prakash Singh Badal. The deputy chief minister, Sukhbir Singh Badal, was also present at the auspicious moment to bless the influential bridegroom. Several ministers, MLAs and the office-bearers of the SAD, BJP and SGPC were seen interacting with other high-profile guests.

Incidentally, the day coincided with the 50th wedding anniversary of Badal Senior. Not missing an opportunity to deliver a speech on the occasion, he reminisced about how simple weddings were in his days and how times have changed.

The event, dotted with unprecedented opulence and grandeur, began at Majitha near Amritsar. About 30,000 guests wined, dined and danced to the bhangra tunes in a humongous pandal covering some 12 acres of land. They feasted on delicacies, including cakes, jalebis and traditional halwa. Vikramjit's marriage with his Delhi-based bride was held on November 25.

And for this purpose, Seonk — a neglected village on the outskirts of Chandigarh — was spruced up for the post-wedding celebration. The two existing link roads of the villages were repaired and widened. Besides, two more new roads were constructed to make it easy for the guests to reach the private farmhouse. The whole village was decked up on the big occasion.

Besides, the state public works department requisitioned the services of several excavators and rollers to level adjoining farms to make way for temporary parking adjacent to the posh farmhouse, owned by a senior bureaucrat.

The villagers are happy that some development work took place in their village. “At least, we are getting good roads,” a villager said. They are not paying attention to reports appearing in local newspapers criticising the politician for wasting tax-payers’ money in building roads and lanes. Like Senior Badal, the villagers know that the Indian wedding industry worth Rs 1,25,000 crore is getting bigger and fatter with each passing year. The industry is growing at an average rate of 25 per cent per annum.

The marriage ceremony, kicked off with a splendid function with an estimated 30,000 invitees in Amritsar on November 22, was planned as a 10-day event spread all the way from Majitha (Amritsar), Delhi and finally back to Chandigarh.

The lavishness being doled out by politicians on weddings is just getting larger. Even the brother-in-law of deputy chief minister didn’t lag behind in displaying his wealth.

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative



Friday, December 04, 2009

Fresh tension in singur

Mamata leads campaign for return of 400 acres of farmland

A year after Ratan Tata pulled the Nano car project out of Singur fresh tension is brewing in this sleepy town 40 km from Kolkata.

The tension surfaced after some officials from the Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) visited Singur for starting a power plant project there.

Predictably, Becharam Manna, the convenor of the Trinamool Congress-backed Krishi Jami Raksha Committee, is leading the second round of protests for the return of 400 acres agriculture land. He said: “We are still against the forcible acquisition of land. A power plant is welcome but we are committed to our stand against acquisition of agricultural land”. He added: “We will now start breaking the boundary wall of the project area.”

Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee, who had forced Tata to relocate its Nano project from Singur to Sanand in Gujarat, made her stand clear by announcing: “The (BHEL) factory can come up on 597 acres but 400 acres have to be returned to farmers from whom land was taken forcibly.”

Senior officials from BHEL and West Bengal Power Development Corporation Ltd homed in on the site for a 1600 MW (two 800 MW units) power plant project. Sources said that BHEL had been working with different governments on setting up power projects. Currently, a project is being executed in Tamil Nadu. And a couple of months back, a meeting was held between BHEL officials and the Bengal chief secretary Asok Mohan Chakrabarti where a proposal was discussed regarding the power project.

Informing the press about BHEL officials' visit to Singur, power minister Mrinal Banerjee said: “BHEL can set up the power factory in Singur if it likes the place. But for setting up a power plant, we think Katwa would be the ideal.” Earlier the state government also had planned to set up a power plant jointly with the public sector Navratna in Katwa, Burdwan.

But it hit a roadblock as farmers opposed land acquisition. This time too things are looking difficult for the government after Mamata Banerjee renewed her proposal for a rail coach factory and demanding the return of the disputed 400 acres to farmers.

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative



Tuesday, December 01, 2009

News @ IIPM - Tagore legacy goes for a toss

Institution is closed as workers, teachers go on strike

Coinciding with UNESCO’s announcement of the year 2010 as the year to commemorate Rabindranath Tagore, Vishwa Bharati, the genius' most outstanding humanitarian gift to posterity, reels under a 10-day-long strike by the staff and the teaching community. The issue started after two Rabindra Bhawan staff were transferred on September 8 this year, following revelation that some ‘unaccessed and precious documents’ of Tagore went surreptitiously into personal possession on September 7. They are Samiran Nandi and Nanda Kishor Mukhopadhyay.

Demanding withdrawal of the order, Karmi Sabha (staff association) sat on a dharna at VC Rajat Kanta Roy’s official residence on September 15. Although the institution bended to their pressure, their attitude forced the institution to lodge a FIR after four days. On October 15, Karmi Sabha threatened a stronger agitation demanding resignation of the VC and started indefinite strike on October 19. A section of the teaching community, under the banner of ‘Adhyapak Sabha (Professors’ Association), joined them from October 27 and relay hunger strike started on October 30.

The university has witnessed incidents like the Nobel medal theft and murder of a girl student by a police driver. Interestingly, the VC also sat on a day’s hunger strike and later met with Governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi. The VC urged Gandhi to institute a CBI probe into the whole episode, including Nobel Theft, to end the deadlock. Reports from both sides reached the office of Chancellor Dr Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi. On 8th day, agitators softened their stand. Instead of resignation, they urged the VC to be on leave during enquiry and on the 10th day, they withdrew their strike only with an assurance of enquiry by a central agency such as CVC/CAG/CBI.
For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative