By Anjan Roy
Nirmala Sitharaman seems to have graduated from being a mere union finance minister to a lofty “management guru” and a spiritual leader.
Nirmala Sitharaman’s comments on the untimely death of a young professional from overwork is symptomatic of the present government’s over-anxiety not to alienate foreign investment into India. They are keen to project a more than friendly face to the world.
Witness Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s trip to USA to attend the QUAD meeting of four powers. However, overshadowing the diplomatic engagements were the high profile interactions the prime minister had with the bosses of influential American multinational corporations.
Principal among these was the new incarnation of Jamie Dimon as the high priest of economic diplomacy. He passes patronising comments on performances of countries as the next major players. Dimon for example has certified India to become a $7 trillion economy under a strong leadership as currently prevailing.
It is well known that many of these global companies work in a fiercely competitive markets and they extract every ounce of blood from their employees. Young professionals are asked to work round the clock and even then the demands never come to a respite.
Punishing work demands work after office work and deep into the night and then they have to report to work immediately between 8 and 8.30 O’clock in the morning. Such punishing schedules day after day take toll on the overall health and well-being of the young workers. Such practices have been chastised extensively in the West and in many countries regulations have been broached.
In China, these practices have given rise to wide scale protests from young professional and many are leaving their well paid jobs and resorting to extreme alternatives. Some are giving up the rat race for career development and large pay packets and simply leaving the jobs market.
These people are being described as resorting to “lying flat”. Others are leaving jobs with well paid multinationals and starting small businesses in the interior of the country, or taking jobs in retail outlets and even working in small restaurants.
They are saying they have gained freshly rediscovered “connections” with people and personality experiences. The dominant feeling is that the rat race was not worth the sacrifices they have to make in a high pressured corporate job.
The Ernst and Young (E&Y) employee had pursued a similar punishing work schedule and was apparently exhausted. Her mother had written to the prime minister about this practice and brought the entire episode before the public eye.
But the present government is mindlessly repeating its burden of the song: India to become third largest economy in the world in another three to four years. In this pursuit the government is seeking to convey a no holds barred overtly friendly image to the international capital. They are expecting to attract large capital flows and investments into the country as a result.
Sitharaman had shown a complete insensitivity to the physical and psychological pressures on the young professionals that the current work practices are mounting. She had even advocated a kind of management “guru” kind of advocacy role.
Like many modern management and manpower development experts — more particularly many of them are Indians — who are talking of the values of yoga and spirituality in withstanding the high pressures that such roles invariably exert.
Sitharaman had assumed a similar role and had observed that “whatever study and jobs you do, you should have the inner strength to handle the pressures.” This is in the same strains as the lectures —which come dime a dozen— that some of the spiritual gurus like Baba Ramdev and others offer.
She further gave the added advice on education system. “Educational institutions should bring in diversity and spirituality. Then our children get the inner strength”. Indulging in the luxury of spirituality and tall talk in the immediate aftermath of an avoidable tragedy.
This is an indirect sermon to the victim why did she lose her so-called “inner strength” to succumb to physical exhaustion. It will possibly not ring very pleasant to the parents of the affected young girl. (IPA
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