Hussain Fakhruddin, India Weblog

India is my country and I love my country like any other foreign national. And this gives me right to criticize about the things I hate most about it.

1. People spitting on road: I just hate it. I am a biker and I cannot go near a bus. You’ll find people spitting out from the window of the bus and that too without looking if someone is down below. People spit on the road, corners of a building staircase, they empty their nose and stick the material on the walls and practically any place where they don’t find another person’s spit.

2. Getting the garbage out of your property only :  In India people keep their houses clean by dirtying their neighbor’s. It takes enormous amount of effort to just throw your garbage at the right place. Instead people just push it to the place which is out of their property and jurisdiction – To their neighbor’s land. Use of plastic and paper in daily lives has increased the garbage to another level, Not to mention that there isn’t a good recycling system, but all this just spreads out on the streets, sewage or some remote area which contributes to a very bad smell everywhere around the place.

3. Bribe: One may have heard about politicians being corrupted, but corruption at local level is also very common. Giving bribe is very common. Without bribe or tip money, its not that your work wont get done, but definitely not smoothly. Everyone takes a bribe or commission in whatever manner they may get the opportunity for. The term ‘chai-pani’ or tea-snacks is quite famous which means some tip for snacks or sweets. Even after paying service charges + service tax , a person would ask for ‘chai-pani’.

4. Unnecessary Wastage: What’s the point in cooking for 10 dishes for a family invited over for dinner. Answer: Show off. This results in a major wastage of food, decoration. Lavish marriages, Lavish apartments, Lavish use of Petrol & energy and everything. Its like “Have money, will spend it”.

5. Media & Controversies: Media plays very important role to destroy the real meaning of news. Some news channels present news in a manner which we call “Masala” or spice which just increases viewer’s attention and not awareness. Political controversies, Celebrity controversies juices up everything which is just unnecessary!

6. Traffic. : Everyone in India is in a hurry. Pedestrians and vehicle owners share the same area of road. Foot paths are for Hawkers selling things on road right from junk computer hardware to cheapest food. Traffic congestion is everywhere.

7. Attitude of people and Competition: In India people compete with each other forgetting the common goal. They keep fighting for their own self meaning rather than achieving a common goal. Everyone has a lazy attitude, until poked by higher authorities they don’t start working or improving things on their own. Laziness among the people doesn’t allow them to be creative and even make others lazy. One dirty fish in the pool makes the entire pool dirty.

8. Caste system and Reservations: Everything in India has caste systems, there is hidden discrimination everywhere. I just hate it when a job is denied to a person just because he may be from another state or another culture. I hate it even more when people treat each other as outcast if one is from separate state. They forget that they are from the same country afterall.

9. Reuse until death. The mentality of people in India is to re-use everything until its final death. A new shirt will be a shirt for a year,  A second hand shirt for a poor guy. Then a dusting cloth for a few months, then a further degraded cleaning cloth for a few months and finally it will end up as a unusable rag. I am ok until the last part. The cloth has finally lost all its recyclable value and ends up as a dead end.

10. Cheapest bargain: Indian’s want to get the best deals from the shop owners. They bargain to the level where in a shop owner will have no profit margins. There are something which can’t be bargained and Indian’s will bargain on that as well. Bargaining is good, but the thing I hate most is that’s its not equal. A shop owner may slaughter a newcomer customer with a sticker shock because some previous customer gave him the least profit margin of the day!

But alas, India is pretty pretty better place to live in comparing its neighborhoods…

Previously wrote a blog on Why Kolkata will never have a barcamp, like two years back. And even now Barcamp never happened in Kolkata!

Here are some of my experiences as an employer in a Metro city which tried to hide away from its siblings when The Software Industry boomed. Thanks to its People and its Government Both!

Recently we posted an advertisement in the largest subscribed newspaper twice. We received some responses which I shall describe. I would treat this as my personal survey for what kind of people exists around Kolkata, West Bengal. Their current pay scales, their expectations, their competency levels, and their adaptability and everything else that a company needs from an employee

1. Almost 90% of all job seekers didn’t know proper English. They somehow managed.

2. Almost 90% were unemployed. 10% were looking for change.

3. 30% were irrelevant job applications. We mentioned requirements of technical people but people even applied for “Any suitable opening”. A CV came in for receptionist post as well.

4. All CVs had TONS  of technologies known but master of NONE. Many CVs were tailored to our requirements mentioning “basic knowledge of XYZ technology”

5. Most funny part was, they CC’ed to other companies’ HR too.

6. Some people didn’t have an email ID, they applied using the cyber parlor or Internet cafe guy’s email ID.

7. We asked for some sample work of their own. We got cut-paste templates from the internet.

8. We received very late responses. These people check emails once or twice a day.

9. Some people applied just for an opportunity.

10. They expectation was quite low. Not sure why, May be lack of confidence. Not many computer software companies in the region, or perhaps they don’t want to fight harder. One person was ready to switch job for a just 12% hike. He was even willing NOT to serve notice period to current employer. This means he could have a ’sudden departure’ with us as well.

11. Freshers are useless unless we train them for at least 6 months. Colleges are least bothered as they get their share. And still the atmosphere in 90% of the software companies in Kolkata is Lazy. Work starts at 10 and finishes at 5. Life is slow here.

12. 75% of people are from non technical background who have undergone a diploma from some ’so called’  reputed computer training industry where faculties are faculties there because they’ve not got any other job!

Some other small things:

1. Our HR is female, People kept addressing Sir.
2. No proper cover letter, Just a cv attached.
3. People email twice. First time they forget to attach their CV
4. Many never replied back at all.
5. They just forward their CV without removing previously applied “TO” in the cover letter.

I cannot blame anyone for such a crisis but may be an eye-opener for the government and the people too, that its high time they should change their attitude towards software industry – Only talks wont do.