I read this EE times article today morning, titled “Indian IT returns to roots”.
- The article starts talking about India winning independence in 1947. And how the nationalist government in 1970 threw out multinationals like Coca-cola. It then states that CMC was setup to manage the mainframes in the country. Then companies like WIPRO and DCM sprung up.
- It then states that TI came to India in 1984, and the government spent 3 years deliberating whether to give it a 64 kbit/second telecom line. I heard it totally different from Wally Rhines, the then chief of TI, who helped setup TI India. In a recent international conference (VLSI India) keynote, he said, through a wonderful twist of fate, they got the connection in a jiffy. Not sure whom to believe here. But that is a different story. It then says that, it has changed now, and a big software company recently obtained a 90 Mbits/second telecon line.
- The article then suddenly does a dive, and says that, not all of India is that fortunate, and that 2/3rds of India still live in villages, and Prof Jhunjhunwala of IIT Madras fame, giving a brilliantly negative statement –
“There are 700 million people who still have no access to any kind of IT automation. We have a few startups here and there, but nothing much has come up by way of any disruptive technology that could change life for the huge rural population in India”
- And the article ends with a luke warm statement from Mr. B.K.Naidu, of SemIndia fame, trying to make an advertisement to his line of work –
“Earlier, when we used to speak of IT products, it was always in the context of what we could do for outsourcing partners, but the scenario is changing. The domestic market is attracting manufacturers as well as design companies. There is an ecosystem that is being created, and if we could get the hardware manufacturing piece right, it would complete the entire food chain.”
I dont see the point in this article at all. Why is there such a negativism in the media? What is the point? Is the author trying to undersell India? (I do notice that she is Indian). And to think, I read this article first thing in the morning, it left me bitterly disappointed.
PS1: The sad part about this is, the article itself seems to be factually inaccurate too.
PS2: I have rewritten this portion of my post three times. I cannot really find the right words to express my disappointment. It always ends with a few expletives for either the author or EETIMES, which I am refraining from publishing.