Dalal is right!
Jagdish Dalal's opinion on “India and the BPO boom” is indeed absorbing. It is, in fact, high time that Indian IT firms learned these lessons. The writer is right in mentioning that IT companies should stop tagging India as a cheaper destination, and instead focus on quality. If we were to jot down the reasons why a select few Indian IT services providers are still enjoying growth, the topmost of them would be their quality delivery. BPO companies must learn from the mistakes of their IT services providers counterparts and not focus too much on lower labor rates. India should not be seen as a cheaper destination, but should be looked upon as a “quality” destination. Only then can we call it a genuine BPO boom.

Sneha Ganesan
Lisle, IL


Dwivedi’s Best Bet
Kamalesh Dwivedi, VP and CIO at ADC Telecommunications, is perhaps right when he said that IT's business is the business and not the technology. CIOs need to think beyond their technology realm without really “falling in love” with technologies. What at the end of the day counts is whether the company is making money. It is also interesting to note that when every IT company looks at partnering with bigger companies, Dwivedi wants to take up smaller companies in his stride to take the next step in growth. I think Dwivedi’s bet on smaller companies would surely yield results in the long run.

Amit Sood
Jackson Heights, NY


Safeway’s Safe Model
Safeway.com's business model is indeed an exercise in restraint, considering the great lengths to which companies like Webvan went, in order to tout non-existent business models. And considering that Safeway already had a brick and mortar grocery retailing business, the transition to “click and mortar” was that much less risky. You should have also focused on Safeway’s failed expansion plans, as seen in its selling off Dominic’s in Illinois, and closing down its chain stores in the East coast. That would have given this article a fairer tilt.

Rohan Narlekar
Bangalore, India


Myopic Mr. Murthy
Mr. Murthy is myopic and obsessed with IIT. IITs’ intake is very small and over the years, they have not grown in size or in scope in line with world-class institutions or research universities like the ones in this country and in line with the population growth. They still teach in the same age-old classroom fashion with very little emphasis on independent research. The reason why IITs are better known than other Indian universities is that they are able to capitalize on their roots and attract highest IQ students or those with the strongest memory-power. A common sense and a statistical analysis will tell you that India has more intelligent and high memory IIT-eligible students than IITs together actually admit. They depend on the government and yet complain if the government wants to manage these institutions in their own bureaucratic, corrupt, incompetent way. The point is, it is not just the IITs that are suffering, it is our entire education system in India. It is rotten to the core, it is obsolete, it is incomplete, it is based on IQ and memory, not on individual traits, performance, motivation, drive, determination, or extracurricular activities. It is a system where every student is supposed to take private tuition and shell out thousands of rupees only to mug up books to get into university. It is a sham.

Himanshu Vaishnav
Los Gatos, CA