‘Leadership will demand a different mindset because of IT’

Sam Pitroda is no stranger to technology or politics. And he does not
hesitate to talk about both. Credited with the Indian PCO boom, Pitroda was one
of the most trusted advisers of the late Rajiv Gandhi. Currently he is the CEO
of UK-based Worldtel and founder of C-SAM Inc, a mobile payment solutions
company. Pitroda was in India recently to campaign for the Congress and in a
freewheeling interview with Dataquest, he spoke explicitly on the state of IT,
politics and how 21st century leadership is being transformed by IT.

Excerpts:

Indian IT is shining only for a few people. Why has it not percolated down
to the grassroots?

So far, the IT industry in India has flourished based on service for foreign
companies. This has given us tremendous amount of confidence. However, our best
brains in IT have been solving Western problems. We have not really addressed
our core problems in IT, whether it is e-governance, e-learning or e-health.
There are small experiments happening in places, but nothing that can be really
scaled up. We have not spent enough time on it and we are not really doing the
kind of research work that needs to be done in many areas. We are basically
selling bodies, a bit more sophisticated ones maybe.

On another keel, our people are not inclined in developing products because
it’s risky, requires a long-term view of the world and you won’t get your
money back in the next quarter. Very few companies are willing to put in money
and wait for results. If you don’t have that kind of stomach, you cannot
develop products. Yes, there are a few products, but as a nation there is still
nothing to be proud of. How can anybody say that with this kind of software
resource we can’t come up with even one global product?

In the last three years, do you think IT has influenced
Indian politics in any way?

It has had a great deal of influence on Indian politics. People now know
what databases, SMSs and websites are. That’s good. And these elections,
political parties have been using IT and communication methodologies
extensively. Following the elections, I think the winning party should use IT to
govern the country better and make systems more open. I also believe they should
put together databases. Databases beginning from all party workers to everybody
who has done any kind of good work in any vertical. And they should be really
detailed—what they have done so far, their likes and dislikes, where they are
etc. Such databases will improve productivity drastically.

Why has eGovernance not taken off as desired?

Because our mindset is not tuned to re-designing processes. We are taking
existing processes and computerizing it. We need laws, processes and attitudes
to change. Instead, we have only taken exactly the same processes that the
British Raj left behind and computerized them. We are getting the worst of both
worlds.

I think we should take the fifty most important things that
people get affected by vis-a-vis government and implementation processes to get
them to people via IT. For example, pensions. Can you go online and find the
status of your pension? And then can you get it deposited in your bank directly?
That’s what IT is for, but we are not doing that because we are busy solving
problems for Citibank. And that is my frustration.

Wi-Fi and Wi-Max—what potential do they have for India?

Cost, cost, cost, cost. Everything is cost. If Wi-Fi can give me more for
less than CDMA, then I will go to Wi-Fi. Irrespective of what technology we are
talking about, it will boil down to a price-performance ratio in the market.

If you were in power, what would be the three things you
would implement to take IT down the ladder?

The first thing I would do is focus on working out a growth strategy for
BSNL and MTNL and how we can give them more freedom and flexibility. Between
those two, we have almost 50 million lines—that’s more than half of India’s
telecom. And that is a real copper mine. Though they are doing relatively well
today, I don’t think its fair to ask them to compete, when private parties can
make decisions faster and can’t being tied down by government norms.

Secondly, I would start a lot more IT R&D institutions,
revive old ones and pump more money into research and development. I will get
young people to run them, give them a list of problems in India to solve and
come back after three years. Do that and you will galvanise this country. But
one should understand that it cannot come from reading newspapers. You have to
live it. Only when you live it, does original thinking come.

Thirdly, I would focus on universal applications and
broadband. I would get broadband to the public because it can ease language
barriers. India is a country with many different languages but it is also very
rich in graphics. We can use this skill to create common symbols that go beyond
language and can be understood by everyone. But we have not captured it yet.
Though I fear that when we move to broadband we will see only dumb Western
dances, I still think its our next priority.

With all that we will be a real global IT power, which we can’t
be by selling bodies. We are happy by the fact that a few companies are
multi-million dollar ones. But we should always remember that ours is a nation
of one billion people.

How do you see IT changing politics in the country?

IT is already changing politics. More young people will come in and you will
see more openness. IT brings about openness, accessibility, connectivity,
democratization and decentralization. These are its most important aspects and
each of them represents a whole new culture. Politicians have to be more open.
When you type my name on the Internet you will see four thousand references. I
can’t hide. You will write an article and it will be on the Web. And someone
sitting in Prague will read it. Every event becomes international instantly.
There is nothing closed. So I must learn to be open, honest, sincere. Secondly,
accessibility–people have to be accessible, whether politician or not, and
more so for them. Next comes connectivity–I have to be in Delhi, Mumbai,
Bangalore, Hyderabad, and many other places. For that, I have to be connected.

Democratization, decentralization–these come by sharing
information and by giving the power of knowledge to more people. All this is
going to transform the leadership qualities of tomorrow. Leadership in the 21st
century will demand, because of IT, a different mindset. It has just begun. IT
is forging new relationships everywhere. We do not understand all of it yet. I
am working on an institute for leadership in Switzerland and the focus really is
IT. My ecosystem breeds how I think. Richer the ecosystem, richer is my content.
And IT widens one’s ecosystem. Leaders cannot put themselves in closets
anymore because IT demands different parameters. People have not even begun to
understand the profound change that is going on around them because of IT.

What do you believe will be the next big disruptive
technology of our times?

Biotech. It has the power to transform different sectors whether it is
agriculture, health, pharma or processes. Everything could look different with
biotech. Square watermelons are being made today because they are easier to
pack. My friend is analyzing the genetic make up of the lighting bug to inject
into trees so that they light up automatically on dark roads. Biotech
applications will be the next big technology wave. But we have to start solving
our own problems, not Western.

But without IT, there can’t be biotech and if IT had not
happened first, biotech would have never gotten anywhere.

Sathya Mithra Ashok in
Bangalore