Saturday, December 30, 2006

A Confession, a Conviction and a Caution - TATA

This is not a neutral perspective. This post is skewed – heavily – against the Indian heavy weight that is getting stronger by the day, and from this biased view point, is getting dangerously, obnoxiously haughty! This column from Clearway states in plain, unambiguous terms, that the giant machinery called Tata needs to be stopped on its paths as it keeps trampling upon the lives of ordinary citizens.

We sometimes get nauseatingly nationalistic, pathetically patriotic that we get emotionally attached to a brand that has risen above all odds to take Brand India to the international arena; a larger-than-life image that hinges very much to the ground-breaking revolutionary visions of a pioneer who is no more, a halo effect that has been transmitted and carried over to his next of generations, to someone who is merely a business man who is worried about his own wealth and his own company!

That most of what Tata does to the consumer is to rape him/ her and plunder him of his hard-earned money is obvious from the cacophony that came out of the blog world, with hundreds of victims of rape filing their FIR’s online. (For more details, a blog search on Tata Indicom/ VSNL would help). It still remains a cacophony because the media is in no mood to raise an eyebrow against a money-studded juggernaut; all it can do is to interview the top man and ask for his opinion about the mess that a part of one of his many businesses is in! Consumers were mugged when they entered the VSNL post-paid internet shop. One wouldn’t expect to find so many unrelated people speaking the same thing unless they were all robbed off in separate circumstances by the organised crime gang of Tata - VSNL.

It was a few months back that one prominent politician expressed his anguish on TV over the way Mr Ratan Tata behaved in the corridors of power. “To ask for land is acceptable; but he demands one particular stretch of land from the Government, which is not right” he moaned, about Mr Ratan Tata. But the brand has become so powerful and integral to the way business is run in the country that no one really bothers to dig into these issues!

Rediff.com conveyed to its audience, mildly, that the quantum of land that Tata demands at Singur is a lot more than what may be necessary, given the scope of the operations that Tata says it has planned. It even compared the area with what Maruti Udyog required for a much smaller operation. And there is no need to be surprised if Tata, in its greed for power and land, tries to buy some people to have its way.

“The government supports us – and to pull out in this situation would not be appropriate”. It was something on similar lines that Mr Tata said in his interview to a private Television Channel. If the government opposes the Tatas on any other business proposition, would Mr Ratan Tata use a similar logic to the issue? “I know this project makes so much economic sense and is integral to the business plans of my company. But since the government has slightly different views on my business, I have decided to scrap it!” Mr Tata, would you take this stand on some issue if the government went against you? Or, you would, perhaps, try to buy your way to muffle the voices before they emerge out, wouldn’t you?

'No, if I believed that we are doing something wrong, then I would be the first one to pull out. If I believe, that this is being manipulated and turned around to meet some specious cause, then I think, what I would do is to dig my heels in,' he contended in the interview.
The problem is, Mr Tata, you are not the sort of guy who would ever believe you did anything wrong. For you, everything is right as long as it brought you money.
'I'm the sort of person who if you put a gun to my head, you can pull the trigger or take the gun away, but I won't move my head,' he had quipped.

You would neither move your head nor would you move your heels, Mr Tata. But the fact remains that you suck blood and your skin has gotten real thick with it. Ms Banerjee’s gun might have had no bullets and the world knows it - there was just no need for you to be moving your head in a hurry! But it would not be too long before some small nail stuck to your roaring motors and punctured your tyres! If you are willing to read, there is so much of writing on the wall – reduce your speed and look into the rear view mirror to count the number of casualties you have caused. If you do not, there is no ivory tower and there may not be a bright future for your dynasty – nothing is built to last for ever!