Abstract
Vinod Gupta grew up in the dusty lanes of a village in Saharanpur, walked his way into the hall of fame and power in the United States, set up his own companies, and through a personal endowment of $2 million set up the Vinod Gupta School of Management at IIT Kharagpur in 1991, donated $1 million to establish Shrimati Ram Rati Gupta Women’s Polytechnic in 2000, set up the Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law at IIT Kharagpur in 2006, Dr Giri Lal Gupta School for Public Health at the University of Lucknow in 2007 and the Dr Shankar Dayal Sharma Institute of Democracy at the University of Lucknow in 2008. In 2008, Steve Jobs hired Joel Podolny, the then dean of the Yale School of Management, to create Apple University. Acharya Vinobha Bhave walked across India asking landlords to consider him as one of their sons and so give him one-seventh of their land which he donated to the landless poor. Luminaries like Bill Gates, Lakshmi Niwas Mittal, Dhirubhai Ambani, Anand Mahindra and Arundhati Roy have been able to influence the world economy and the society in innumerable ways. There are sundry vital and pressing issues which require deep focussing such as jobs for the teeming millions of people who are ready to enter the workforce every month, the highly skewed ratio of males to females in several states of many countries, illiteracy, unending contamination of the fragile ecosystem, setting up of Special Economic Zones (SEZs), child labour, provision of primary health care services, food security, rising prices, transportation problems especially in case of the north-eastern parts of our country which are almost cut-off from the rest of the country, use and sharing of energy, land and water resources: The spectrum requiring immediate attention is indeed very large. A dialogue between business leaders and social leaders is perhaps imperative and much needed in the present scenario and that is where the fascinating tome under review fits in. It would not be an exaggeration to say that business leaders as well as social leaders can in fact be major game changers.
The book under review is an enthralling odyssey of eight chapters, an introduction and an epilogue. The first chapter examines the formidable challenges of employability for all citizens, child labour, education for all considering the cost and quality parameters vis-à-vis social audits. The chapter is enriched with a dialogue between three titans—Rohini Nilekani (philanthropist, journalist, author and social activist), Sunil Mittal (chairman and group CEO, Bharti Enterprises) and Aruna Roy (an IAS officer who quit her service and is a well-known social activist). The second chapter provides a view of the enervating regional differences in access to primary and formal health care services. The chapter is enriched with a dialogue between three titans—Rohini Nilekani, Habil Khorakiwala (managing director of Wockhardt Ltd) and Mirai Chatterjee (coordinator of Social Security at Self-Employed Women’s Association). The third chapter dwells on some of the most important issues such as food security (or insecurity). The chapter brings out a miserable fact that 65 million tonnes of food grains were available with the Food Corporation of India in September 2010, and yet according to National Family Health Survey of India, 55 per cent of children living in rural areas and 45 per cent children in urban areas suffer from malnutrition. It explains the concepts of mass, hidden and transient hunger. The chapter contains a meaningful dialogue between Rohini Nilekani, Suman Sahai (well-known figure in the field of agricultural research) and M.S. Banga (who has worked with the Unilever Group for 33 years). The fourth chapter provides a bird’s-eye view of India’s land-use planning and transport systems, including the Indian railway network, navigable waterways, air travel and roadways. With the Metro railway gaining more and more importance in different cities, Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission spurring many cities to develop their bus systems, the hubbub and hullabaloo caused by the launch of the Tata Nano in March 2009, cities bursting at their seams with the burgeoning population, it is necessary to understand the role which can be played by the private sector and the public sector in the area of Transportation Systems. The chapter is enriched with the views of Rohini Nilekani, Rahul Bajaj (chairman of the Bajaj Group), and Professor Dinesh Mohan (Henry Ford Professor for Biomechanics and Transportation Safety, IIT Delhi).
The fifth chapter is devoted to the use, owning and sharing of land. The chapter dwells on the 44th Constitutional Amendment (1978), Article 300(A), the National Rehabilitation and Resettlement Policy, 2007, and a new Land Titling Bill which is pending in the Parliament. The chapter contains a discussion between Rohini Nilekani, Medha Patkar (Narmada Bachao Andolan) and Anand Mahindra (vice-chairman and managing director of Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd). The sixth chapter is devoted to one of the most outsized challenge to the civilisation, that is, energy issues specially when the world is witnessing vast climatic changes, and terms like greenhouse effect and global warming have entered common parlance. The chapter does justice to dominant paradigms related to power planning in our country. The chapter contains a dialogue between the CEO of one of the biggest companies of India, namely, Mukesh Ambani, and Dr R.K. Pachauri (chairman of the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change). The seventh chapter is devoted to a conundrum known as Financial Inclusion. The chapter describes in detail the efforts made in the direction of the use of financial offerings. It contains a highly meaningful discussion between Rohini Nilekani, Vijay Mahajan (founder and chairman of the BASIX Group) and Uday Kotak (principal founder, promoter, executive vice-chairman and managing director of Kotak Bank). The eighth chapter brings out the facts that economy is a subset of ecology, and organisations that increase the efficiency of natural resources can amass huge savings and thus, achieve competitive advantage. It contains ideas which can be helpful in building social capital and natural capital. The chapter presents an interesting map of possibilities through a riveting discussion between Sunita Narain (Director of Centre for Science and Environment) and Y.C. Deveshwar (chief executive and chairman of ITC Ltd).
The book is written after painstaking research. It contains eye-opening statistics given by Participatory Research in Asia (an international centre for learning and promotion of participation and democratic governance), John Hopkins University, Central Statistical Organization, Ministry of Labour, India Human Development Survey. The book provides the much-needed information related to National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC), Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY), National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM), Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Act (MGNREGA), New Pension Scheme (started in 2009), Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS), National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), and government-sponsored insurance schemes such as Arogyasri in Andhra Pradesh.
The book under review will be beneficial to the policy-makers, NGOs, champions of public–private partnerships and Corporate Social Responsibility, management teachers and students. It may be a splendid idea of making a book like this compulsory reading as a part of management syllabus. The students can be asked to read the book and write a review in perhaps 3,000 words or so. It would go a long way in broadening the thinking horizon, sharpening management skills, inspiring future leaders and changing lives and the face of the future in positive ways. The book actually dwells on issues which need to be discussed on a common platform and which require a common solution for the good of all. Also, there is an urgent need for dialogue between business, social and political leaders as well as implementation of new policies for overall development.