Is there Life Beyond Dewang Mehta?

Eight years ago, in the conference hall of the Cricket Club of India, a

solemn group of people from Aptech were assembled. It was a great moment, the

award of ISO 9001 for education support services, and the chief guest was none

other than Harish Mehta, industry doyen and one of the main influences in my own

career shift from manufacturing to information technology. Along with Harish

that evening, came a burst of fresh air, an irrepressible spirit who would

change my perception of the IT industry forever–Dewang Mehta. The ease with

which he interacted with one and all of us, his easy humor and infectious

enthusiasm lit up the evening for the whole gathering.

The incandescence, the exuberance, the joie de vivre that characterized

Dewang Mehta has influenced the lives of countless information technology

professionals and aspirants. Among them also, a hapless young Gujarat earthquake

survivor. Apart from the enormous influence he had on the kings and kingmakers

of this young industry, it was the emotional hold he had on all our heartstrings

that will enshrine Dewang in every fiber of our being forever.

My own personal memories of Dewang will remain etched in my conscious and

subconscious. A person who never tired of telling me and Uma to find him a wife,

who would not hesitate to drive over for a meal whenever we were in Delhi, and

who, many a time would catch the evening flight to Mumbai, have dinner with us

and fly back late in the night. Maybe it was this insatiable desire to be on

aircraft flying to all reaches of the world and the restless urge for new

experiences and adventures every hour that burnt him out even as the flame of

his brilliance was just reaching its peak.

It would not be an indulgence in hyperbole to say Dewang Mehta transformed an

entire industry. His confidence about the ongoing success of the software

exports industry bordered on arrogance, the way he pulled out astonishing growth

figures out of a hat and motivated all of us to make them a reality is the stuff

that folklore could be made of. Most important, behind the insouciance and the

charisma was a razor-sharp brain that could quickly analyze and defuse a

potentially explosive situation and see opportunities well before the rest of us

could even sense what was happening. He straddled Nasscom like a veritable

colossus and made it an association that was the cynosure of all business and

political eyes, an entity to be admired, sometimes hated and feared, but never

ignored!

Nasscom after Dewang Mehta

It is often said the real hallmarks of great men are the institutions they

build and leave behind. Many of us who take pride in building companies would

find it difficult even across a lifetime to build the kind of institution that

Dewang made out of Nasscom in barely a decade. From being an offshoot of the

hardware industry, Dewang made Nasscom a major powerhouse, initially in Delhi,

then all over India, and by the end of the nineties, all over the world.

And the deftness of Dewang’s approach was apparent in the fact that nobody

resented his amazing flair for publicity, which seemed to attract the press like

bees to a honeypot! Successive chairmen of Nasscom happily yielded pride of

place to Dewang, other associations adopted him as their own and the doors of

every bureaucrat and politician were always open to his ideas and suggestions.

Dewang leaves Nasscom strong, financially successful and a recognized

opinion-maker and leader in the IT Industry. The Nasscom—Mckinsey target of

building an $80-billion industry by 2008 will have to fall on the shoulders of

lesser mortals, now that Atlas has not only shrugged but relinquished his place

forever after holding the industry high in the esteem of nations all over the

world.

What role does Nasscom have to play in the turbulent times that lie ahead for

the global and national economy and specifically the information technology

sector? At a recent CII meet, Omkar Goswami pointed out the economic miracle

that has characterized the nineties, where global market capitalization grew to

a level of $35 trillion, which is almost 15% higher than global GDP. Compare

this to 1990 when the market capitalization was 40% of GDP and the overheating

of markets and expectations becomes apparent. In such a buoyant situation,

customer and consumer confidence zoomed and spending on technology reached

levels that were sometimes as high as 16—18% of revenue for many service

firms.

Now suddenly, the reality check has set in. The growth in the US economy has

dwindled to 1.6% and the slowdown is expected to continue for at least four,

perhaps even six quarters. The BSE Sensex could well seek a level of 2,800—2,900

in the near term and then find a lower or higher level. The malaise hitting the

US could inevitable spread to the UK and Continental Europe and Asia, caught

between a Japan that continues to flounder and a slowing continent could find

the double-digit growth figures that characterized the boom period for the Asian

Tigers impossible to repeat.

While this may seem to be an excessive bout of pessimism and not worthy of

the optimistic Dewang Mehta to whom this column is dedicated, there is little

doubt that extraordinary times will call for extraordinary rallying by the next

Nasscom leader. He will have to provide new vision to the software industry and

lift the hardware sector and the entire economy out of the morass it is in

today!

Nasscom is an association that has seen some outstanding leaders in the last

decade. From Harish Mehta to Saurabh Shrivastava to Phiroz Vandrewala, with the

guiding hand of FC Kohli always at hand, the captains of industry have steered

the ship with aplomb. The work will be harder from now on, for a hand that

steadied the rudder and sought new shores was always there, but the man wielding

that hand is not in his rightful place anymore. A new helmsman will be found,

but all the captains will have to re-dedicate some of their energies to the task

of nation and industry building, if the tryst with the $80-billion destiny is to

be kept.

In conclusion, for a nation in shock and an industry in mourning, there is no

consolation in the knowing that ‘the show must go on’. It will, sure, but

without its biggest showman! My last interaction with Dewang was just after his

Asia Society speech in Bangalore, after which I pointed out that he had pulled

out his entire repertoire of old jokes. Dewang, in his inimitable style, winked

and said, "Ganesh, not only did everybody laugh, but you, who have heard

the same jokes from me countless times, laughed the loudest." Who could

deny that? Sleep well, sweet prince, and let us remember you for your humor,

your sagacity and most of all, your innate goodness that touched our lives in

such a profound manner.

Ganesh Natarajan



is deputy chairman and managing director of Zensar Technologies, and one of the
legion of friends and followers of Dewang Mehta who mourn his passing