Prashanti'sOpinion

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Who says there is only bad in this world ?
There is a lot of good as well . Though news papers are full of reports on murders , rapes , looting and swindling , there is still a lot of good in this world .
I say this because of a personal experience . The other day my aunts , together with my mother and myself , went shopping . My aunt's car was parked near Bata ( anyone in Hyd knows that spot) . Leaving the driver to park the car we left for shopping in Gen Bazaar .
When we came back there was another car parked right in front of our car horizontally . Horizontally !! There was just not enough space to get our car out . We were stranded in the car park ! My Uncle who was to be picked up from office was waiting for us to come, and there we were in the car park !
We sounded our horn and waited a long while to see if someone would come to remove the car or if the owners would come to retrieve it . No one came .
In the meantime the other drivers who had parked their cars there and were waiting for the owners to return asked us what the matter was .
Our driver had seen the car being parked ,but, seeing that the driver was right alongside it to remove it if necessary, had not said anything . He left the car for a short 10 min and returned to find that the driver had gone somewhere leaving us stranded .
Then the other drivers came and shifted the Maruti van that was parked on one side of our car and gave directions to our driver who was driving the car to bring it out .
Even when there was no need for them to bother about our problem they rallied around and offered their assistance . I think it shows that humanity is not yet dead . People do come to help others in times of need .
Total strangers treated it as if it was their problem to get us out of there ! There is a divine spark in all of us that prompts us to help our fellow human beings , so I guess it is true that there is a Paramatma in every Jeevatma .

I hope many others will try to see the good that is in every human being to some extent or the other .

Saturday, April 01, 2006

I was watching a feature in the News today in which Mr. Narayan Murthy was giving his opinion about something . I am in awe of him , and have been ever since I first heard about him . There was an article in which his meteoric rise in the s/w industry was described . I think that everyone can learn something from him .

I mean how many of us would be willing to sacrifice the safety of our jobs to establish a separate corporation !!
So much has to come together for it to happen .
  • Hardwork : he had it in spades .
  • Family support : his wife actually gave him not only the permission to step into the unknown , she financed it !
  • Talent : He had the extraordinary organizational ability in order to not only establish an organization but also to take that org to the top .
  • Continued Hardwork : He continues to be it's successful CEO .

On this I would like to quote Jeffery Archer's Line in his first bestseller Not A Penny More Not A Penny Less . It goes something like this "It is always difficult to make a million honestly . It is slightly easier to make a million dishonestly . The most difficult thing is hanging onto the million you have made ." (If I have quoted anything wrong in this quote then it is my error entirely !)
That was what struck me most about Mr .Narayan Murthy . He made his first million honestly . And he not only managed to hang onto it but went on to break all records of making millions !
As to the second part of the quote , I think the prime example of making a million dishonestly would be Mr.Dhirubhai Ambani .
How many of us would be capable of not only hanging onto our millions but to our integrity and principles as well ?
Look at IT people today . More and more incidents of IT people going to bars and clubs and pubs and behaving like a cheap villian in a Hindi movie are being reported everyday .(Throwing money at dancing girls , liasing with hookers etc .)
How many have the moral fibre to gracefully accept success (monetary success that is , for there are different types of success in life .) ?
He (Mr.Narayan Murthy) not only works hard himself but also hires only the hardworking . I once heard him say that " If my son does not clear the test for hiring people then I would not give him a job in my org. "
What great thoughs !! On the one hand we have politicians who are busy trying to prevent their sons from going to jail for just punishment for crimes committed . And on the other hand there are people like Mr.Murthy who nip nepotism in the bud !
May India continue to have hardworking individuals and great thinkers like Mr. Narayan Murthy . It is because of people like him that as an old saying in Telugu goes "Varshalu kurusthunnayi , pantalu panduthunnayi ."("We are blessed with rains and good crops ." It is believed in India that only when good deeds are done by people that God blesses the land and Nature showers its boons on the people .)
I hope many more people will learn from the example that Mr. Murthy has set .