|  |  |  | | | | | Soutik Biswas' Election 09 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | He has been called India's reluctant billionaire. There are many stories of publicity-shy software tycoon Azim Premji's frugal habits - flying economy class; taking an auto-rickshaw from the airport after not finding his car; borrowing magazines from the company library and living on its campus. So it was not surprising when Mr Premji announced last week that he would donate nearly $2bn (£1.3bn) to fund rural education and development programmes in India. He may be - as Forbes magazine reckons - the third richest Indian and the 28th richest person in the world, with an estimated net worth of more than $17bn (£11bn). But he has also been seen as a model of a businessman of great rectitude. His Bangalore-based Wipro employs almost 100,000 people worldwide, and is one of India's most respected companies. Mr Premji remains an exception in the world of Indian business. India has some 60 billionaires. The wealth of its top 10 billionaires equals 12% of its GDP, compared to just 1% in China, 5% in Brazil and 9% in Russia. The combined net worth of India's 100 wealthiest people is about a quarter of its GDP. But the philanthropic record of India's rich is spotty. A few like the Tatas - who built and run the city of Jamshedpur and have a decent record in what is called corporate social responsibility - appear to have been more generous than the others. In recent years, India's billionaires have given away money to their alma mater, mostly foreign universities. A mobile phone giant has set up a foundation for underprivileged children; a tyre company has invested in containing HIV/Aids. The chairman of a leading software company has said he would set aside 10% of his wealth for philanthropy. A tea company has adopted several hundred villages. But one suspects that it all does not add up to much, considering the enormous concentration of wealth in the hands of India's rich and the power they wield.
Are Indians then too greedy to be philanthropic? Americans, for example, are known to be generous, giving away some $300bn - or 2% of the nation's GDP - to charity. There are no figures available for India - a much poorer country - but I am sure they will not be anywhere close. I don't think some people are hardwired for altruism and others aren't - an act of charity is often spurred by an incentive of publicity and media coverage. Readers always responded handsomely whenever a magazine I used to work with launched a donation drive following a devastating flood or an earthquake. "You give not only because you want to help but because it makes you look good, or feel good, or perhaps feel less bad," write economist Steven Levitt and journalist Stephen Dubner in SuperFreakonomics. So, traditionally, India's businessmen have felt that they have contributed enough to society by giving away a lot of money towards building of temples. Many believe that India's rich are not generous enough and flaunt their wealth vulgarly in a country where the majority are poor. One reason could be that most Indian businesses are run by families and have mercantile origins. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh once appealed to businessmen to share their profits with the common man, maximise profits "within levels of decency" and refrain from ostentatious display of wealth because such "vulgarity insults the poor". Gurcharan Das, a writer and management guru who has worked with some of India's top companies, believes that Indian capitalism has begun to flower in the past few decades and wealth is "now being created" in plenty. He believes that the rich will begin to contribute to social causes in a big way soon, and Mr Premji's $2bn charity for education sets an "important" precedent. Time will tell whether Mr Das is being too optimistic.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  "Indian journalists are fixers!" shouted a young lady in the audience during a play I attended in Mumbai last week. She even took the name of one of the country's leading news presenters to demonstrate her point. The play was about to begin, and one of the actors was engaging in casual banter with the audience. "Do you think news is unbiased in our country?" he asked.
Many in the audience guffawed, and the lady spoke up in outrage. At that moment it struck me how much the controversy over leaked phone conversations between some senior Indian journalists and a prominent lobbyist had enraged people. It is, clearly, the Indian media's biggest crisis of credibility.
To cut a long story short, transcripts of the leaked tapes, published in two magazines, reveal some journalists in conversation with a corporate lobbyist, who also owns a public relations company. Nothing wrong with that - journalists routinely speak to a range of people for information. In the leaked tapes, some of the reporters trade vicious gossip. Others "promise" to pass on sensitive political messages and information. Still others give the lobbyist tips on how to organise a scripted media interview with a business baron. The journalists have said in their defence that they have neither received any favours or relayed any information or fixed things as a result of these conversations.
People don't buy it entirely. A recent poll after the tapes were released showed that 86% of people felt let down by journalists. Also, 66% said that the media was protecting its own tribe by not reporting on the tapes adequately. Let's face it - the stock of journalists has hit a new low in India.
After last year's general elections, independent investigations revealed how "paid news" had become commonplace in many Indian papers and news channels - politicians were paying them to publish favourable stories. But the leaked tapes have cast a cloud over the credibility of some of the country's top journalists.
Whether the allegations of fixing and lobbying are true or not, we will possibly never know. But critics believe the tapes point to a bigger crisis in the media. The cosying up to politicians and businessmen is just one issue. Many point to an increasing lack of grace and dignity among many leading journalists, and the crass self-promotion that threatens to turn news into purely entertainment. My friend and editor Kai Friese says the mainstream media in India is "driven by compulsions of grand narcissism and greed".
Night after night, on India's news TV, top journalists, often fawning and self-righteous, conduct interviews and talk shows. It all sounds very noisy and rather contrived. They claim every other story as an exclusive, even when it isn't. Top film critics are paid off by producers to write glowing reviews - the Bollywood publicity machine has effectively muzzled most film criticism in India. Portions of an editor's letter to readers in a top magazine are plagiarised from a leading American online publication, then blamed on jet lag. Another big worry is how the public relations industry has subsumed a lot of journalism, mostly because journalists have been happy to play along.
Possibly, it had to happen in a country where institutions are weak and corruption is rife. It is an environment where the media can wield extraordinary power - and many a time this is used responsibly to expose and explore India's many ills. It is also an environment where journalists can lose their heads easily and suffer from delusions of grandeur because of easy access to politicians and businessmen. The fact that India remains an intensely hierarchical society also reflects the way journalists behave and interact with powerful politicians and businessmen - it is almost never a professional relationship between equals.
Most Indian media owners need a new covenant with their journalists. For too long and far too often, they have been seen to hire journalists to do their dirty work - negotiating with politicians, businessmen, public relations executives and lobbyists. It is an open secret that many editors and senior journalists are part-time reporters - and full-time fixers for their owners.
Critics say that many owners have emasculated editors so much that they have become faceless and supine, only too willing to roll over for the powers that be and facilitate deals. With some 60,000 newspapers and 500 news channels, India has one of the world's most vibrant and competitive media environments. It is now time to take a reality check and ask whether all is well with it.
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