Lost in the din of the high decibel TV heat generated by the Italian government’s short lived refusal to let two trigger happy sailors come back to India to face murder charges was the fact that there was a real legal issue here that Italy was trying to unsuccessfully agitate with India. Recall the facts. MV Enrica Lexie was traveling from Singapore to Egypt with a crew of 34 including 19 Indians accompanied by six Italian marines from the San Marco Regiment, while the fishing trawler St. Antonyleft Neendakara Kerala with a crew of 11 to fish for tuna. If you buy the Indian story, the incident occurred at approximately 16:30 IST on 15 February 2012some 20.5 nautical miles off the coast of Kerala within India’s Contiguous zone.If you buy the Italian story, satellite tracking confirms that the tanker was at the time 33 miles off the south west coast of India, well outside our territorial waters. Clearly, there is a disputed question of fact here you can really practice your prejudices on. Either ways, the tragedy may have been a warning shot based on a misreading of the situation that went wrong. It may be true that small fishing boats do not chase down ocean going tankers but it is equally true that I wouldn’t want our soldiers tried by a court in Congo or elsewhere because they went on a turkey shoot in the rebel infested African bush and hit some locals. This is classic mixed emotion stuff.The key thing though is that you don’t have to be a soldier to inadvertently kill someone. In every such case, if you achieve this terrifying unlikely event in international air or water, the question is: who should try you?Which is why the Supreme Court has so far unsuccessfully tried to get our United Particularly Ambivalent Government to set up a special court to decide this question?You would be naïve to think this could not happen to you. Imagine yourself basking in the tropical sun along the railings of a cruise ship in the Strait of Malacca. Your only cousin, who will inherit half of your ancestral house in Chanakyapuri Delhi strolls towards you holding his sixth double Pina Colada and being unsteady on his feet, kicks your toe, loses balance and is pitched over the side. You hear a splash far below, and then see sharks in a frenzy in rose tinted waters that quickly ebb away. The sole witness, standing twenty feet off simply saw you trip him up. There is no body to recover and no autopsy report of too much alcohol in the bloodstream. Why will I not assume that you killed a co-inheritor of a valuable property? Will you find yourself meeting your fate in the jail in Malacca? Why deal with such grave stuff?You brush against a man in the aisle of an airplane: the man loses his temper and expresses an opinion about your mother while pushing you violently. You are bent over backwards as he reaches for your face. You try to right yourself and you push back. He trips over, hits his neck against the seat and breaks it. Like it or not, you probably are guilty of killing him and you are going to be tried for it. Not everyone accused of a crime in a foreign land picked up a gun and brought on his own Armageddon. All life is a wager and so many get it in the neck for very little - or nothing - they did. Which court hauls these guys across the legal coals?Let’s look at Indian law on this point. First, Section 4 of the Indian Penal Code extends the operation of Indian law to every citizen of India regardless of whether the offense was committed in or out of India. So if you decide to kill someone in Barkina Faso, you can be tried in India, which may be no bad thing given the state of the jails in Sierra Leone! The Penal Code also extends the same courtesy to every person who is on a ship or aircraft registered in India. In sum, any Indian citizen anywhere in the world, and every foreigner in India, or on an Indian ship or aircraft overseas, can be tried in an Indian court. Most countries have created similar laws. To resolve conflict of laws, nations have signed a multiplicity of treaties that govern this question of jurisdiction. Let me try and summarize the position for you. First let’s look at crimes committed at sea.If you are an NRI holding an American passport aboard Cruise ship Superstar Libra on the Kidmat Island to Goa cruise from Bombay, you will find yourself on a ship run by a Hong Kong company but on a ship registered in Nassau in the Bahamas. Now, if you are accused of tripping your cousin into the shark infested waters of the Indian Ocean, you can be tried in the Bahamas. At the same time, if you pitched your cousin into the sea within the territorial waters of Lakshdweep, you can be tried in the Indian courts at the same time. Third, if you committed this crime on the high seas, you would ordinarily be tried by American courts. Finally, although you are an American national, if you have spent the last ten years working in your company’s manufacturing facility in Chengdu, you can also be tried in China because that is where you can be “ordinarily found”! Either ways, once that cousin has been tripped, four legal dogs will be tearing you limb for limb with intent to try you in their court. It’s not quite different for flying. If you are an ethnic Indian holding an American passport aboard an Aeroflot flight on your way from Delhi to Hurgada in Egypt, you could be tried for pushing your abusive co-passenger where the airplane is registered i.e. Moscow. You could also be tried in Egypt because that is where the plane landed after the crime was committed. As you can guess, you can also be tried in America because you are after all an American citizen. In addition, if you want your teenage daughters to grow up in India and are trying to stabilize an outsourcing set up in Gurgaon for the last few years, you could be tried here. Any which way you look at it, pushing people around in the air is a dodgy idea though I can see the potential for jailbird tourism in it!Given all these confusing ‘jurisdictional’ realities of high seas and international air space crimes, what are we to think about what to do with our Italian stallions? The Kerala sessions court has arrogated to itself the power to try these men even though we know that this court’s jurisdiction does not extend to the next district, leave alone twenty or thirty three miles out to sea. Considering that this court has done so with respect to soldiers of another country on duty on a ship running the risk of piracy, I would expect the Italians to be upset. Since the jurisdiction of the state extends to only 12 nautical miles, on 18 January 2013, the Supreme Court of India ruled that Kerala did not have authority to adjudicate on the case.The Supreme Court also asked the Union Government to constitute a special federal court to try these marines in accordance with international law. Well aware of all these issues, why should anyone be surprised that the Supreme Court was less than paranoid in granting the Italians bail to go home for short periods from time to time? Do bear in mind that ten weeks later, there is still no court in sight and we may not see one for ten years.So what is the correct position in international law? It is debatable at the best of times. Italy claims sovereign immunity for its soldiers from prosecution in foreign courts. India claims there is a limit to sovereign immunity because these soldiers were on contract protecting the private interests of the ship owners, not projecting the power of the Italian sovereign. The jurisdiction question is as we have noted above a complex one but on this we should be able to agree: in such situations, everyone and their country cousins have jurisdiction and jurisdiction is exercised most legitimately by he who nabs the stallions first. This is probably the greatest learning that any jet setter can derive from this international tragedy. If it is your misfortune to find yourself on the accused end of an inadvertent crime, since you know that the hounds will tear at each other to get at you, you would do well to be sure that you hold on to your hat and go running into the kennel of the hound that has the least brutal way of dealing with undertrials and persons accused of crimes. Best of luck.(The author is managing partner of the Gurgaon-based corporate law firm N South. He is the author of “Winning Legal Wars” and “Bullshit Quotient: Decoding India’s corporate, social and legal Fine Print”. He can be contacted at rcd@nsouthlaw.com).
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There are of course countless ways to give up the good fight. When it comes to Corporate Governance and Compliance, Parliament has decided that the best way to do it is to find a third party sucker and drop the dying donkey in his laps! Why else would the Companies Bill 2011 provide that the entire ethical burden of the company be carried on the shoulders of Independent Directors? This may be radical and innovative, but as Ganga is my maiyya, somebody gonna get hurt!Since 1956, we have run a great Company law which helped our political-industrial complex thrive without being unduly bothered by the finer points of probity. Boards of Indian companies revelled in credible deniability. No individual director had either power or responsibility and the role was performed in the collective wisdom of the Board. In the upshot, every individual could claim that it wasn’t his scam to run or support and proof of conspiracy being as hard as it is, the system ticked along rather nicely.To wit, Sebi did try to spoil the mood in this happy paradise when it pushed Independent Directors to take an iconoclastic line as part of clause 49 of Listing Agreements. It made a poor start though, because it defined Independent Directors as people who had no “other material pecuniary relationship” with the company, its promoters, management or subsidiary outside the directors remuneration which “in the judgment of the Board may affect independence of judgment of the directors”. When conflict of interest becomes a matter of opinion, you can be damn sure the law isn’t worth a damn, and it wasn’t.That didn’t end the matter. Sebi’s clause 49 also let directors off the hook except in circumstances where an “offence has been committed by the connivance or is attributable to any gross negligence of the officer” (Sec 21 SCR Act). On top of that, other than the Audit Committee, Independent Directors really had no role at all. This was par for the course because everyone knew that Independent Directors were creations of promoters who served under their pleasure. You could say this bit of “tokenism” kept India’s crony democracy in place while feeding our appetite for moral posturing. It was all good thus far in the desi badlands.Meanwhile, storm clouds were looming. To take India to the next level, our intellectual elites determined that we needed transparency, honesty and probity in corporate life. How to get there? The Company Bill 2011 is the result. First, we have decided to assign a specific individual responsibility based role to every director. Thus, Section 166 expects directors to act in accordance with the Company’s Articles, promote objects of the Company for the benefit of every one and their uncles including minority shareholders, employees, the community and protect the environment too! It sounds like the kind of speech Michael Jackson would have made when he won his first of eight Grammies for “Thriller”! Sec 166 then goes on to specify other duties. The good news though is that if a director breaches these duties, he shells out some cash - five lakhs at most - and he’s out of there.Independent Directors don’t have it so easy. First, Sec 149 sets out a comprehensive definition of who is qualified to be one so it’s hard to be an independent director this side of Gandhigiri. Next, it steers Independent Directors to a seriously heavy weight Schedule IV which creates a whole new role for them. Speaking compositely, the new bill does four things. First, it identifies Independent Directors as GRC drivers. The upshot of this is that the guy who sits on the outside with an independent role and has no money in the company carries the moral burden while the guy who sits on the inside and on the money slips through the compliance fingers. That’s pretty curious. Second, it enjoins Independent Directors to become protectors of minority shareholders, a sort of stake-less David taking on the might of the successful entrepreneur.That is institutionalized in-board hostility on the principle of it. Third, it expects him to be an independent voice expected to “scrutinise the performance of management in meeting agreed goals and…monitor the reporting of performance”. Curiouser and curiouser thought Alice! Finally, it expects him to hold separate meetings without management or the other directors and review the performance of the rest of the Board. So now, the Gandhigiri saint who is hostile to the promoter and reviews promoter performance at board meetings also meets behind the back of the company’s prime movers and second guesses whatever they do. If this was Jim Morrison’s idea, you could say that out here in the parameters, we are stoned immaculate!This enlarged role may be great for the ego of a kick-ass external director of Sebi’s dreams,intent Dirty Harry style on making his day but it comes with grave risk. Sec 149 also provides that “Independent Director shall be…liable only in respect of acts of omission or commission by a company which had occurred with his knowledge, attributable through board processes, and with his consent or connivance or where he had not acted diligently.” (Emphasis Supplied). So what does “acted diligently” mean for an Independent Director? Please refer to Schedule IV.Schedule IV is one hell of a diligence list to meet. Allow me to share some potential infractions with you. Schedule IV, Part 1, Guidelines of Professional Conduct Clause 1 requires Independent Directors to “uphold ethical standards of integrity and probity”. Clause 9 of the same part expects them to “assist the company in implementing the best corporate governance practices”.Schedule IV, Part II, Role and Functions, Clause 4 expects them to “satisfy themselves on the integrity of financial information”.Forget the rest: would you say that this last clause 4 is enough to damn every Independent Director of every Indian company or not?The next time the Great Satyam Scam reincarnates, every Independent Director is going to have a long haul summer in the cooler. That apart, when we get to Sec 23M of the SCR Act, we are talking ten years in jail and 25 crore in penalties.To me, the Independent Director’snew role is impossible because of the manner in which our democracy is structured. I dealt with this in last month’s Fineprint when observing that the Companies Bill was unfairly Terrorizing Auditors and I would encourage you to check it out if you haven’t already. Very briefly, our democracy consists of coalitions of colluding castes who come together to seize power in each state in order to appropriate the state’s enormous resources to themselves and their supporters. In turn, state level groups collude to establish a Union Government who then usurps Union resources in the same way. Extortion of the corporate sector is part of the deal. The ruling dispensation in Delhi right now is not run by fools who have distributed billions to fraudulent ‘social upliftment schemes’ and bankrupted the Government without very good reason knowing fully well that this allows all sorts of dodgy state sponsored criminals to misappropriate most of this equity and distribute it to a variety of political constituencies. Some of these misappropriation schemes are also run as corporate empires and there is more on this in The Pontyfication Of Politics Processes. Asking Independent Directors to stem the tide of political payments and radically alter the structure of our democracy is more than an exercise in fantasy. At the very least, you can’t ask them to carry this burden without placing a similar burden on those who do the extorting. Till this is done, they can take a bribe, you can’t give it and you can’t run your business without giving it either. Basically, you are toast: any which way but lose.I must admit though that there is reason for hope though. It may well be that the mismatch between – how should I put it - political amorality and corporate culpability is in the process of being bridged. Already, when I see the Chautalas in jail and the Kalmadis facing charge sheets, I begin to believe that the inflection point has been crossed. But two swallows don’t a summer make and I don’t yet see a systemic prosecution of political corruption. You can be optimistic, but you aren’t immune from extortion. Maybe, the new world of blissful honesty will dawn, and dawnsoon, but till it does, Independent Directors will face clear and present danger of being the fall guys in times of radical change. As the situation stands today, the choice before an independent director then is to either stop a bullet or immediately draft a really polite letter of resignation. In pursuit of a pragmatic instinct for self preservation, I am for the resignation.(The author is managing partner of the Gurgaon-based corporate law firm N South. He is the author of “Winning Legal Wars” and “Bullshit Quotient: Decoding India’s corporate, social and legal Fine Print”. He can be contacted at rcd@nsouthlaw.com).
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As we are about to enter the room where Lord Jeffrey Archer is meeting journalists, a loud yell emanates from inside. The manager from Landmark, the book chain that has invited the best-selling novelist to India, rushes in alarmed –- but comes out a minute later looking relieved. “A wicket just fell, and Archer got very excited,” he says, ushering you in. “Sorry for coming between you and cricket,” you apologise as you are introduced to the 72-year-old author. “Yes, how utterly inconsiderate of you, young lady,” Archer responds instantly, saying cricket is the only luxury he allows himself. You discover that the master storyteller is also a bit of a drama king, theatrically scolding everyone in the room for making him miss such exciting cricket (well, with Shikhar Dhawan in such an awesome debut in the India Vs Australia test match at Mohali, you cannot blame him) and bellowing at the photographer when he asks him to move to another chair. He expostulates about the rain delays at Mohali and comes down heavily on the use of mop and bucket to dry the pitch. “God, that’s so 14th century. Still squeezing out the water with mops! I thought you were a modern nation,” he scoffs. “Do you know at the Lords, they dry the ground so quickly.”The discussion, you find tends to keep veering to cricket (only Test cricket mind you, Archer dismisses the shorter versions as tomfoolery), but occasionally the man, who is here to promote ‘The Best Kept Secret’ does consent to talk books. Excerpts from a conversation with BW | Businessworld's Chitra Narayanan:If you tot up your book sales, apparently, every 12th person on the planet has read a Jeffrey Archer novel. How does that feel? Where did you get that statistic? That’s frightening to hear. Is that a burden?No, it’s not a burden, but it is pressure. Because when you sit down to write a new book that fact is in your mind. You sit down and go.. “One upon a time..” and then think this better be good. The burden would be if nobody was reading me. In fact, a couple of nights ago, I was very tired signing book after book and the queue was still stretching out and I thought, why do I bother? Then immediately the thought struck - would I like it if there were only 10 people here at the signing. Of course not. So, I said to myself, you are lucky, very privileged, and get on with the signing.India probably has done a lot to contribute to that statistic.Oh yes. Undoubtedly. Do you know there were one thousand 18 year old girls at Bangalore at the book signing. Nobody in England will believe me. But I have got a picture. ("Show her the picture, go on show her the proof," he tells the Landmark staff). Best Kept Secret By Jeffrey ArcherPublisher: Pan Macmillan IndiaPages: 400Price: Rs 350You have written sequels to novels before. But Clifton Chronicles is the first series? Is there a difference in approach?Really in the end, the Clifton Chronicles will be one big novel. The story of the Cliftons and Barringtons and what happens in their lives. Each one about 400 pages, 120,000 words. The joy is in taking the characters onto the next book rather than starting afresh. You have Harry and Emma, and Maisie and Hugo and everybody moving through the books -– some die, of course.But why did you move to a series? Is that a fad now?At the age of 70, I took the decision. I was terrified of slowing down, and not going flat out. I have always been very focused and disciplined in my writing. There are no distractions when I write. Not even cricket. And let me tell you. I won’t die -– they will have to kill me.You ended Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less with the protagonists promising to return the money? We expected a sequel with that happening. Is that ever going to happen?Certainly not. You are too moral to think on those lines.Is that the best book you have written?20-25 per cent of my fans think it is the best thing I have done. It isn’t. Kane and Abel changed my life. But The Clifton Chronicles is the best thing I have ever done. It’s a piece of craftsmanship. Which is the character that you are particularly fond of?Old Jack Tar in Only Time will Tell. Charlie Trumper in As the Crow Flies. Florentyna in Kane and Abel.There’s also some criticism that many of your characters are a bit thin?Thin? No certainly not – they are all fat now.Any of the characters based on yourself?I am Harry. My wife is Emma, my mother’s Maisie. Jane Austen taught us how to base characters on real people and I do that all the time.Are you obsessed with rags-to-riches stories?People enjoy aspirational stories -– people enjoy someone coming from nothing and making it to the top. Dickens did it. There’s nothing new in that. But as a theme, yes, I enjoy it.Do you write with a screenplay in mind?That’s a very Indian question. No I don’t. I am a storyteller. I write books hoping that people read them. At the moment, Columbia is making Paths of Glory. They will start filming in September, but I will believe it when I see it. CBS are making a pilot of the Eleventh Commandment and ITV is looking at the Clifton Chronicles for a television series. So lots is happening.Do they involve you in the process?Once my agent has sold it, they don’t seem to take much interest in the author. Sadly.Would you like to get involved?Yes, I would like to see what’s going on. Do you think the age of eBooks and eReaders will affect the fortunes of writers? Their payments?It will make me richer. Well, I can tell you that my books sell for 3 pounds hardback in England and Amazon pays me that much. I only get richer. But I think new authors might have cause to worry. What next after this series?I originally thought that Clifton Chronicles would be five volumes. Problem is I have written four already. Well, the first draft of the fourth is ready. And Harry is only 45 years old in that. So, it will probably be six or seven books, rather than five. Then I am going to write a book of short stories. After that I am going to write the biggest novel in my life. I have an idea. It’s been percolating in my head for several years now. It is bigger than Kane & Abel.You keep juggling between short stories and novels.. how do you do that?I like the change of pace. Over a period of five years, I collect a set of short stories. I have got nine so far of the 12 that I need for my next book of short stories. For instance, you might give me an idea this afternoon. I keep collecting stories and make a pile of them. And over time, I say okay, here is the 12 and put it out.Any Indian stories in the next bunch?I have got an Indian story from Calcutta. Brilliant, wonderful story. Someone told me a story that happened to them.So your stories are based on what people tell you?About half are. But the best ones are the ones where someone tells me the story and you embellish it,change it, but the germ came from them.Who are the authors you admire?Scott Fitzergland, Dickens, Maupassant, H.H. Munro.Any Indian authors?R.K. Narayan –- he is a great storyteller . So is Vikram Seth. And maybe this man after today. (He pats the pile of Saadat Hasan Manto's translations he has just been gifted and which he says he is going to start reading).businessworldbooks (at) gmail (dot) com
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Many years ago, I found myself eavesdropping on a conversation between two senior automobile company executives in an elevator. “This is terrible. How will we cope? It will affect our profits,” said one greying executive. “We can’t afford it. The industry will have to fight it,” said the other in a grim tone. This was 1995. The executives were reacting to a court decision that would force companies to install catalytic convertors in all cars sold in four large metros of the country. The industry carped a lot about this rule and tried to whip up anger among consumers. They said affordability of cars would be affected by such devices even though it was clear that air pollution would be significantly lower. Indian auto industry is among the most efficient in the country and has manufactured world class products under trying conditions. But the auto industry remains myopic and petty on issues of environment, passenger safety and consumer interest. It has now an established track record of reforming only under duress. Automobile manufacturers have taken most consumer friendly decisions only after being forced to by legislation, government pressue or judicial activism. Even two-wheeler makers were forced to install indicator lamps. They did not install the lamps willingly. Automobile companies refuse to place air bags in cars today for the same reason that they did not want to equip cars with seat belts. Their reason is that the consumer does not demand it. Companies say, these features will raise the cost of cars. But this reason is churlish at best. Consumers would also want cheap tyres and cheap headlamps. Would this reason be enough to compromise passenger safety? Every consumer wants a cheaper product, but lowering of cost can’t be done by reducing safety features. If all cars had airbags, would car sales drop? Not really. Consumers would factor it in and feel safer. Especially at a time when highway accidents in India are increasing, car companies should fit airbags on their own. Instead, they wait until legislation forces them to make it mandatory. True to their track record, automobile companies are trying their best to block competition in after sales service and sales of spares. The Competition Commission of India is probing restrictive trade practices of 17 automobile companies. These companies sell spares to consumers through an opaque pricing mechanism only through designated sellers. Consumers can’t buy genuine parts from any other seller since the companies do not provide the parts. This effectively creates an environment where competition does not exist. To top this, companies spend millions to educate consumers about the perils on buying non-genuine parts. Essentially this scares buyers away from non-designated sellers. This is pretty much how cartels operate. Independent after sales service providers are not given genuine spares by the manufacturers. Presence of such players would lead to competition for authorised sellers and therefore reduce the profit margin on sales of spares. The Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) is very shrill in protecting its members from lower import duty and higher excise duty. But it is stunningly silent about attempts by industry to kill competition in after sales service.Most companies operate with a monopoly mindset despite their claims that the industry is very competitive. Once a car is sold to consumers, companies virtually abandon them. At the time of purchase, buyers are wooed with garlands and trinkets (quite literally). But after the sale is done, it is the turn of the consumer to chase dealers and service stations for basic attention. In the last two decades, I have owned vehicles made by three of the largest car makers in the country. But despite the increased competition in the industry, I still have to plead with dealers of each company to get my vehicle serviced. The other option is to go the unorganised sector where I never know what is being done to my car. Car company representatives blame the authorised dealer and express helplessness at poor servicing standards. But in a classic case of duplicity, the same car companies vociferously protect these non-performing dealers from increased competition. The reason: fat margins on spares and service that is shared by the dealer with the car company. Hopefully, the Competition Commission of India will break this stranglehold and force companies to officially support independent service chains. This myopia from an industry that has been visionary is baffling. Short term profits seem to be overshadowing long term benefits. Cheaper service will only encourage more consumers to invest in vehicles. The volumes game will become even bigger. Earning the consumer’s faith is important. And it can’t be done by slick ad campaigns alone. There have been many instances of new cars catching fire and hurting passengers. SIAM has been strangely silent on this issue. A frank dialogue on this would work better than burying the issue. There is another pending issue where the industry has not moved fast enough. Recycling of cars is mandated to be managed by the industry in most developed markets. It is currently not mandated in India though SIAM has taken nascent steps by working with the government to set up a recycling unit for cars that are no longer usable. Auto companies will have to move rapidly to invest in such facilities before legislation forces them to do it. Recycling is a win-win situation since up to 90 per cent of a car can be recycled and monetised. This will free up road space occupied by old cars and help reduce the impact on environment. The auto industry has much to cleaning up to do. The gleaming exteriors of new vehicles can’t hide the dark practices of the industry. Ignoring the interests of consumers and environment is like driving with the hand-brake on. (Pranjal Sharma is a senior business writer. He can be contacted at pranjalx@gmail.com)
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In his first speech after being anointed as president of his country last week, Xi Jinping’s message was clear: China will grow the way China knows best and the world needs to accept the Chinese way, as much as the Chinese themselves need to."We must make persistent efforts, press ahead with indomitable will, continue to push forward the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and strive to achieve the Chinese dream of great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation," Xi was quoted as saying by the official Xinhua news agency. To realise the "Chinese dream," China must take the Chinese way, he said.Xi’s formal anointment as China’s new supreme leader – he’s head of the Communist Party, the government as well as the military – comes at a crucial time in world history. In the past decade, as China has grown, the United States has seen it power wane; the global economic turbulence has impacted the West severely and the view that power is shifting to Asia has gained currency.China is on the brink of becoming the world’s biggest economy and it will be an event that will unfold under Xi’s watch. China also faces the danger of a social and political implosion as growing aspirations and wider connections with the world is prompting people to question the supremacy of the Communist Party.The Chinese dream, put forth by Xi, Xinhua said in a separate commentary, was “to build a moderately prosperous society and realise national rejuvenation by sustaining growth through deepening reforms and transforming growth pattern. It is a dream of national strength and prosperity, and happiness of the people.”Stability is the key word here. And Xi, who will rule for a decade, has his task cut out.While externally China has the financial muscle and the economic might to dictate its terms, internally, the man who replaced Hu Jintao, has a bigger problem to tackle at home: he has to ensure the supremacy of the Communist Party and savagely attack corruption that has prompted people to question its political power.More importantly, Xi also has to ensure continued economic growth, generation of enough jobs and balancing of an export-led economy that has been hit hard by the global slowdown. At least three generations of Chinese have seen nothing but economic growth and their expectations from the government and the party that rules their country is huge.In short, what Xi is saying is that all those who expect China’s political system to change will have to wait longer. He and his team are not going to rock the boat too much. Yes, they will clean up the party and the government of corruption so that the party’s power is not eroded, but will they opt for a different political system? No, they won’t. As long as China continues to grow and people can be kept happy, there is little need for big changes anyway. Any unreasonable turn could only bring about a collapse of a nation of 1.3 billion people. It’s best to keep the large ship moving in the direction it is moving than force it to make a quick U-turn.Following cases involving high-profile party officials that rattled the Communist Party leadership last year, tackling corruption seems to be high on Xi’s list of things to do. Given that the government and the party are deeply intertwined, Xi’s concerns are valid. If political corruption begins to erode the party’s power, the government itself will be in danger in a country where the leadership is keen to “preserve the political integrity of Communists.”Can one imagine China without its Communist Party? Some would want to, but the Chinese themselves can’t. And that’s the reason why Xi is pushing the “Chinese dream” – a sense of deep nationalism and patriotism that he hopes will bind the Chinese people together in facing external threats and internal instability that the Communist Party is best placed to battle."We are shouldering the heavy task bestowed by the history and going through the test of the times. We must uphold the principle that the Party was founded for the public good and that it exercises state power for the people, supervise our own conduct and run the Party with strict discipline, enhance the Party's art of leadership and governance, and strengthen the ability to resist corruption, prevent degeneration and ward off risks," Xi was quoted as saying.The party, for Xi, is paramount. It should not only lead and unite the people, but also build socialism with Chinese characteristics. In there is a message for the Chinese people: The party is the only organisation that can look after you and ensure your well-being; it will continue to do so even it has to change. Believe in it, trust it and don’t give up on it because giving up would only mean trouble for you and the country.At another level, Xi and his team are sending out realistic messages on the economy. There is now a realisation that the fast-paced, double-digit growth that powered China’s ascension as a global power is a thing of the past. A more manageable 7-7.5 per cent growth until 2020, backed by deeper reforms and a new growth paradigm – shift from investment to consumption -- will help build a moderately prosperous society, which will be good for both economic and political stability.Xi has 10 years to change China. It seems he has time, but a decade in a nation’s life is but a small window. His will be, therefore, an exciting journey as China seeks its place in the sun in a world that is changing fast.(The columnist is President, Public Affairs, Genesis Burson-Marsteller, and a former newspaper editor. He has a keen interest in matters involving China and Southeast Asia. Views expressed here are personal)
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Travel, search and social networking are among the fastest growing spaces online. India’s online reach in the travel segment has crossed the worldwide average, according to measurement company comScore. With the Indian traveler now increasingly going online to make travel plans, sites like TripAdvisor which offer information to the travelling community say they are seeing a big jump in traffic. While predominantly a B2C site, TripAdvisor also has a B2B element to it offering business listings. Brian Payea, Head of Industry Relations, TripAdvisor for Business was recently in Delhi and explains to BW Online’s Tanuja Chatterjee on how the model works. How many businesses are now using TripAdvisor for Business in India? What has been the offtake?As of January 2013, there are a total of 22,406 Indian accommodations listed on TripAdvisor out of which 58 per cent have at least one registered owner with the TripAdvisor Management Centre which they need to do in order to write responses to their reviews. However, our data shows that only 4.7 per cent of hotels in India listed on TripAdvisor have responded to user reviews on TripAdvisor in the last 30 days. Amongst the Indian properties reviewed on TripAdvisor, 70.7 per cent were rated 3.5 or higher out of 5. To thrive, Indian hoteliers must encourage new reviews to help build their TripAdvisor overall review score. Reviews play an important role in travellers’ decisions when booking a hotel. We encourage Indian accommodations to register with the TripAdvisor Management Centre so that they can take immediate control of their online reputation by engaging with past guests as well as the wider traveller community According to a study conducted by PhoCusWright on behalf of TripAdvisor*, more than half (53 per cent) of respondents state that they will not book a hotel that does not have any reviews on the site”. What is the revenue model of TripAdvisor for Business? TripAdvisor for Business offers Business Listings, a paid-for subscription option available for accommodation property owners who wish to increase direct bookings from their TripAdvisor page. Business Listings allows accommodations to add their direct contact details, including their URL, email address and phone number, to their TripAdvisor listing and post customised special offers on high visibility pages on the site. You have already started advertising through 'TripAdvisor for Business'. Don’t you think this will give a biased image of the company that is advertising?Actually this was a request from the properties themselves. They wanted to have this opportunity to advertise. This is especially important in a market like India which can be compared to some of the markets in the west. In the West, there tend to be more independent small properties and bread and breakfast setups. These properties wanted the ability to participate in commerce and asked us for some way to do that. So we built this as a business of service model. Without having to talk to somebody in TripAdvisor, the members can purchase a small 2-3 room property in a small location on their own and basically compete head to head with a big property. In the Indian market, you see a mix of big brands of properties right next to very small boutiques. When you see other commerce businesses at TripAdvisor, you see that five years ago a minimum purchase was enormous just because of the difficulty in servicing. There were those types of commercial plans but now with this model, side by side you have a very small varied entry. With user generated content, there is always a fear that some of the content might be with a mal-intent. What are the checks and balances you have in place to keep content reliable?TripAdvisor was originally founded in 2000 as a search engine, but not as a review site. It was an afterthought that we allowed users to comment on what they read there. In 2001, the company was essentially running out of money and somebody recognised that the search engine wasn’t doing much. But travelers were putting a lot of content on that themselves, and so the whole company changed direction. So right from the beginning, there was recognition that because it is an open system and an opinion site not linked to transaction, where they don’t require a receipt to put up a review, there was a potential for people to misuse it. So right from that first review back in 2001, we have had a very strong policy, procedure and processes to safeguard the integrity of TripAdvisor. Kindly elaborate a bit about these policies and procedures...We are always on top of our immediate resources to detect any effort to misguide the user. There are companies that make systemic efforts to do so, like, telling a hotel how to move on TripAdvisor etc. We can always detect it. Any company that tries to do so is penalised. We have many automated resources that are constantly filtering and reviewing the content, the moment they are uploaded. When these automated sources turn something up and even a hotelier or a traveler report something amiss, our team of investigators swing into action. The investigators have criminal justice backgrounds . Next is our string of public communicators. There are huge number of people who rely on internet surveys to grab information about a destination. If you look at the research and survey that we completed in September last year, you will notice that 98 per cent of the people who completed the survey said that what they found at the property was absolutely consistent to their expectations. We also are the only travel company which has a new integration with Facebook and are working towards the development of our social circle as well. Sites such as TripAdvisor and MouthShut may have ended up ruining many businesses? Conversely, how many businesses has TripAdvisor helped?The majority of reviews on TripAdvisor are in fact positive – 70.7 per cent of Indian accommodations listed on TripAdvisor have a rating of 3.5 or higher. An independent study, conducted by PhoCusWright on behalf of TripAdvisor*, reveals that travellers are a savvy and discerning bunch, as they take reviewers' track records into account when picking a hotel and generally ignore extreme comments. According to the PhoCusWright study, 71 per cent of users state that they like to see basic information (i.e., number of reviews written) about contributors as they browse through reviews. 59 per cent of users indicate that when reading reviews, they ignore extreme comments. The survey also finds that travellers expect hotel management to be actively responding to their reviews, and those who do stand to generate more business. Responding to reviews — both positive and negative — shows travellers that you are paying attention and taking customer feedback seriously. According to the study, 78 per cent of users agree that seeing a hotel management response to reviews “makes me believe that it cares more about its guests.” TripAdvisor for Business was launched to listen to, communicate with and better serve the hospitality sector and travel industry. We encourage all business owners to register for free on TripAdvisor so that they can manage their property’s listing on the site and leverage our free tools and resources to make the most out of their presence on TripAdvisor. They are offered a number of widgets and badges, which they can add to their own websites or Facebook pages, to display their TripAdvisor content, including recent reviews, ratings and any TripAdvisor awards they have won. Perhaps the most important tool in the Management Centre is the Management Response feature, ensuring business owners are able to contribute their side of the story and thank reviewers for feedback. We also offer Master Classes and webinars, which are free seminar sessions for hospitality business owners to provide them with more information about TripAdvisor and offer tips and strategies for making the most of their presence on the site. Last year, over 650 Indian hoteliers attended four such Master Classes we held in New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata. How is the traffic volume and quality of businesses on TripAdvisor?An increasing number of Indian travellers are visiting TripAdvisor as part of their hotel selection process. TripAdvisor’s data shows that from December 2011 to December 2012, monthly page views for accommodations in India on site have increased by 68.7 per cent. A recently published report by the Cornell University’s Centre for Hospitality Research** further shows that a little more than one-fourth (26.5 per cent) of TripAdvisor visits occur in the last five days prior to reservation booking – a pattern indicating that user reviews are one of the final criteria in the hotel booking process. The Cornell study shows that as a property’s social reputation improves, its overall performance also improves. A stronger online reputation allows a hotel to increase its prices while maintaining the same occupancy levels. The rating increase therefore leads to higher revenue and improved performance. The Cornell Study therefore offers a compelling case for Indian hoteliers to take immediate action to manage their online reputation by engaging with past guests as well as the wider traveller community through management responses and show them that they’re paying attention and taking customer feedback seriously.
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In a freewheeling tête-à-tête with BW Online’s Sanjitha Rao Chaini, author and management guru Robin Sharma insists that leadership is about the fundamentals and warns top executives not to let their ego scream so loudly and they cannot hear what subordinates have to say. What brings you here? The book I am really here to talk about the The Leader Who Had No Title. It is about an idea that every single person in business gets not just an opportunity to work but also to show leadership quality within their work. The old model of leadership says that you need to be a managing director to drive change to get results. But The Leader Who Had No Title says imagine if every single person did not see themselves as the powerless victim, but as the Picasso of their works, someone who could drive change, someone who could be part of the solution versus part of the problem. A job is only a job if you chose to see it as a job. Does that mean designations are not important? This is a key point. Designations are important for smooth running and structure of organisations. Ultimately, there should be an executive team where there is accountability. I am simply asking you to go back to your company and create a culture of leadership where every one in every position now says I have to show leadership quality in my work versus to sit back, close his eyes and be a passive victim. Leadership is not about a title, it's about innovation, living the brand values and being inspirational. The best leaders are interested in the benefit of the company than their own egos What are your thoughts on efforts to detach ego with leadership? It’s easier said that done... Anything's difficult to execute. An idea remains an idea if you don't execute it. The best leaders are more interested in impact and not just income. They are more interested in growing more leaders as opposed to stroking their ego. That's the difference between a great leader and a bad leader. That's just an idea. Just because it's an idea, it doesn't mean it won't work or we shouldn't discuss it. We shouldn't stop working towards it. How do you build a great company? It's not just the idea that builds great companies such as Google, Facebook, FedEx... the Tata Group or Starbucks. It's the daily, flawless, monomaniacal execution around the idea. Of course, it all comes down to execution of the idea. So, does this require leaders in every possible department within an organisation, and people to mentor them? Yes. Your competitive advantage in the organisation comes down to growing leaders in every level faster than the competition. The person who sweeps up at the end of the day, an employee in IT, sales, and the one who answers the phone -- every single person should start thinking like a leader. And that means no complaining or blaming, innovating, being great in what you do in contributing to the results of the organisation. Second, those who have titles, their No. 1 responsibility is to grow more leaders. If you have 50 people working for you, make it a 50-leader organisation. The manager's job, and the leader's job, is to build more leaders. If you are not growing more leaders, you are not leading your following. Let's be honest, the job of a leader is to inspire, to push people to do their best work. How should top executives manage their older subordinates? Leadership is about the fundamentals. You have the position of responsibility. Don't fall in love with your title to the point that your ego is screaming so loudly and you cannot hear what your subordinates are saying. Who would you be without your excuses? I asked this question during a talk and one of the participants said, “My biggest excuse is my experience”. If you study people like Picasso, Da Vinci or Einstein, you would realise that they had an apprentice's mindset versus a master's mindset. The moment you think you are the master, you lose the mastery. Let's go to the world of business. One of our clients is BlackBerry. One of the co-founders, according to a report I read, fell in love with what he thought to be true. And he fell in love with the dominant market position. And Apple and Samsung ate them for breakfast. At the end of the day, leadership is not about excuses, it's about the results So, if every employee has been performing like a leader and showing results, how should the leader work towards employee appreciation within the organisation? Every employee requires appreciation. Just give him that. GE is one of our clients. They used to call these things Jack Letters. Every year he would sign a thousand handwritten ‘thank you’ notes. It's a small gesture that helps. Ronald Reagan wrote a ‘thank you’ note to his speech writer for a brilliant speech she had written for him and she put it up on her door for years. When I was in law school, one of my friends got into medical school and he put up his admission letter on the door. Sometimes appreciation is more valuable than money. And I want to be very clear here -- I am not saying money is not important. But according to one of the research, employees want appreciation from their manager more than anything else and one of the reasons they leave is because he did not feel special. Second thing, how do you honour these people who are CEOs of their own jobs? You give them growth. They want challenging work, they want to express their gifts and talents through challenging work. According to this research, money was eighth in the list of what top talent wants. We have to remember that this generation is different. They want to work with a company with top values; they want to change the world; they want to be connected with other human beings. And money was less important. For mentoring, leaders need to let go. How does a leader learn to let go? I am going to quote former American president (Harry S.) Truman. He said, "It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit." You have to let other people shine. You can get to your dreams by empowering others. The job of the leader is also to lead themselves. The best leaders spend a lot of time in self reflection, in meditation; they spend a lot of time reading books to enhance their own character. And all these help in business. As you become more powerful, you tend to empower others as well. The best leaders are interested in the benefit of the company than their own egos. But in these days, amidst travelling, meetings, striking deals, meeting employees, leaders hardly have time to introspect... Average leaders dilute in their focus; real leaders are monomaniacally focussed. Exceptional business people leverage and use time that ordinary business people waste. If you look at the best companies in the world, Amazon, HP and so on, they still make time to grow more leaders around them and appreciate their employees. What's the point in being busy if you are busy around wrong things? In India, there are several family-owned businesses where scions automatically take over the top title irrespective of the fact that they are fit for the job... At the end of the day, leadership is not about excuses, it's about the results. Leadership is not about the genetic make-up. India is a competing on a global stage. May the fastest and the greatest leader win. May the most innovative leader win versus the leader who knows the right people. And if an organisation is populated with people in their positions of power just because of the background that they are from, they could simply get knocked out of the game. Because leadership is about doing your work as good as Picasso painted. It's about developing a team of super stars. If you want an A-Level company, you must have A-Level employees. Leadership is about innovating so that every single thing you touch becomes better than you found it. It's about being an inspirational person. People did not like Steve Jobs when they worked with him. But they said his acumen, vision, his way of doing things inspired them. Ultimately, leadership is about walking talking value creator. How important is a B-school degree for a leader? Let me be very clear here. I have great respect for the business schools, and for formal education too. Yet, leadership is much less about managing matrix and more about inspiring people. In B-schools, they talk about operations of a business, strategy and processes, and all those things are important. But sometimes knowing too much is detrimental in businesses. Which is why we are seeing 17-year-olds are ruling a lot of industries, because they have a beginner's mind set. Take Richard Branson, he doesn't have a university degree. So, he did not know what was not possible. What makes the best leaders is not their education or their IQ. It's called grit. Literally they have an idea and they simply do not give up until they execute and deliver the idea. And they don't teach grit in business school. I am a lawyer and they don't teach grit in law school. That's a character quality. It's about being ridiculously persistent about your goal, making your dreams 10 times larger. sanjitha.bw (at) gmail (dot) com
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North Malabar in Kerala offers a veritable cornucopia of tales, which are curiously unending and, often, unwinding. This lush landscape that completes the upper torso of the God's Own Country has provided vernacular fiction with countless plots, most of which are unnerving and enigmatic. In local fiction, several writers have tried to tap this pool, and many have found immense success at that. But in English, not many have tried to write fiction around this geography. On the cue, Monsoons In Malabar, debut novel from Kannur-based academic P.V. Jayaraj is a laudable effort. Jayaraj's self-published work is a short novel. That said, its canvas is interestingly wide and encompasses a string of stories that unravel the social dynamics of a complex society in the 1970s and afterward. Jayaraj's narrative is simple and aptly lacks festoons. He treats the prose with certain dedicated misery. Even while letting the protagonist of the novel, Ravi Shanker, to roam around the densely populated and chaotically labyrinthine alleys of memories, the author exhibits a commendable restraint in such a way that the reader is not infested with even the slightest sense of disarray. But the lackadaisically edited prose jars the rhythm at times. That's the bane of most of the self-published works in India. And this glitch points to the fact that self-published authors have a lot of catching up to do in terms of assimilating global best practises in, say, editing and similar key areas. Despite that, Jayaraj manages to capture the nuances of the milieu somewhat clearly. Also, there is a neatly set undertone of suspense. For instance, the novel starts with a car journey Shanker undertakes from Bangalore to North Malabar's Kalloor using a road that cuts through a thick patch of forests. "The eerie gloom" of the forest can "unnerve even the grittiest". Surely, the reader is alarmed of an impending turmoil of sorts. On his journey, Shanker lets his mind swim through the wavy waters of his past where we meet a series of characters -- interesting, disturbing, angst-inviting. Through Shanker's stream-of-consciousness tour, Jayaraj tries to penetrate the deeper layers of a society that is customised to the varied needs of patriarchy. The communities that he documents in the novel are case studies of societies in transition. Jayaraj has an eye for history, though it is slightly myopic. With certain success, he tries to elevate the narrative to the level of a social commentary by devoting several chunks of the novel for discussions on the caste system in North Malabar. From the "highly sanguinary" Thangals to effeminate-by-circumstances Nair men to aggressive migrant Christians, Jayaraj's narrative tries to map some of the key socio-religious dramatis personae of the time. And he does some justice to it, even though haste and incomplete research forces some of his superlative motives to die prematurely. The characters are well articulated. And they are exposed easily. Shanker's interaction with others, especially with his parents, friends and above all Unnielayachan, a prominent element that defines Shanker's past and present, are all captured without much hassle. The world that Jayaraj builds is inspired by the literature in vogue. But he blends the obvious with the unexpected effortlessly to create a seemingly surreal experience. How much has he succeeded in this endeavour is left to the reader's own good judgement. To be frank, the novel's wide canvas demands a much roomy narrative that could hold several plots and subplots. For instance, there are several characters who appear to have had a lot of stories to tell. Again, there are several instances such as how English education has influenced lives in North Malabar that could have been given a much more detailed discussion. Maybe, Jayaraj can address them in a voluminous sequel. And one also hopes he would also shed his inhibitions and write more beautiful sex. The book is recommended to those who are interested in the history and geography of North Kerala and, of course, to all those that love the monsoons, the thriving torrential force that connects many a slices of lives in the southern state. businessworldbooks (at) gmail (dot) com
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