Wanted: some fiery catalysts

Wanted: some fiery catalysts
By G Sabarinathan
Deccan Herald

There is a lot that the industry can do without depending on the non-existent administration in Bangalore

The IT industry has done a great deal not just for Bangalore but also for the country as a whole, economically and socially, despite what certain politicians may have said recently.

As the industry moves forward, its leaders need to remember a few things, and then hopefully businesses other than software services will take note of the initiatives.

Clearly, there is a complete vacuum in the field of administration in the city.

That said, there is a lot that industry can do, without depending on the non-existent administration in the city.

Businesses seem to think that the buildings that they own or hire only need to house their employees and the bare minimum of utilities.

These buildings do not provide parking space for the private vehicles of their employees or visitors.

The result is that the public footpaths in front of these offices become parking lots.

Often, vehicles then spill over to arterial roads, leading to avoidable traffic congestion and the huge attendant social cost.

Every time I step out of the campus I am grimly reminded of the social cost by a large software company opposite the IIM campus and the call centre of a large multinational bank in the neighbourhood.

Even worse, I pray for a safe journey without traffic snarls caused by the transport of its scores of employees.

Clearly, as a citizen I do not believe that I should have to bear what I believe is the private cost of these companies being in what are apparently extremely profitable businesses.

This problem could easily be solved either by encouraging employees to depend more on company transport or by ensuring that the buildings that they hire or purchase have adequate parking space.

By saving on the private cost of parking spaces or transporting employees, which is a legitimate cost of doing business, software companies impose a cost on the innocent public in the form of longer commuting time and other costs.

Many of these buildings are alleged to violate building norms or to have been built on properties that may cause long- term ecological damage by filling up water bodies or valuable “lung space”.

In an interesting article Ranjit Hoskote recently traced the misery caused by the floods in Mumbai to the indifference of the city's businesses to its ecology and to the rapacity of real estate developers.

It should not be too difficult for businesses in Bangalore to pre-empt a similar disaster by having the building plan as well as its legitimacy independently validated by their own architects.

Should businesses bother about these issues, which do not concern them directly?

Well, if garment retailers in the western world could be asked to ensure that the dyes used in the material they buy is not harmful to the environment, or that the garment manufacturer in a ‘third world’ country has not used child labour, these obligations are not far removed from the purview of the software companies, are they?

These ideas are not in the realm of some woolly notions of corporate social responsibility.

If we had a functioning government, as in many western countries, these would be mandated requirements for doing business.

Progressive and enlightened managements in Bangalore would do well to take the lead in voluntarily paying attention to these aspects.

As the IT services industry expands it makes a lot of business sense for companies to expand geographically.

Smaller towns allow greater productivity due to shorter commuting time. They also afford lower costs of living. Smaller towns are attractive in particular for companies that employ large numbers of engineers where the skills required are not of a specialised or rare nature that may only be found in larger cities such as Bangalore.

An idea like this requires a few catalysts to catch on. After all, a decade ago when Infosys decided to diversify locations and move out of the city whoever would have imagined that it would make good business sense?

There are hundreds of different ways in which the management of companies can improve the living conditions of the city, by meeting the true and full cost of doing business.

Instead, if they choose to be guided by short-term considerations and try to take advantage of the non-existent administration provided in the city, collectively they will inherit a place in which life will be unbearable not just for the average citizen, but also for the businesses of Bangalore and their employees.

It does not require a lot of imagination to see the writing on the wall.

(The writer teaches at the IIM Bangalore.)