Coronavirus Part 14, Pitching For IT Globalisation, Positive Stories From Pandemic and Free Smartphones

                 One of the ways to look at my last 3 month journey is I worked like a CM of a state, PM of a country, CEO of a company, Dean of a college, Principal of a school, leader-in-chief and every individual where the buck stops. It has been my basis since past many years but feverishly increased in the last 3 months. It also has to do with my weekly updates which have reached a new pitch. No one can agree more with the fact that I am doing a great job within my means. Here I would like to touch upon a point which most Indians do. Everyone draws a boundary around them and never comes out of it. They never assume higher responsibility or act above their roles. They are extremely content in their own little roles and find it happy at the end of the day if they are getting paid for it. Many are content to follow than to lead. As a result of this herd mentality success or failure of a state or any entity depends entirely on its leader.

                 You are placing so much burden on one single person. I may be a follower in my own way but I am doing it differently. I am assuming the leaders responsibilities and helping them no end. I am rising above my own boundaries and stretching as far as I can. I would urge everyone to imbibe this quality and be a PM within your own self, be a CM within your own self, be a CEO within your own self, be a leader within your own self. You can do your own job but try to impact the nation like a PM does to the nation, like a CM does to a state, like a CEO does to a organisation. When we breach the limits and assume higher responsibilities, we can grow faster. It’s high time, everyone learn this quality and everyone acts like a PM. It’s high time for everyone to go above and beyond what they are doing and assume broader responsibilities. Everyone should work as hard as a PM does.  A country of 130 crore cannot be lead by a single person, it has to be 130 crore PMs.

                 A development which has been imposed by the recent pandemic is the world which is hitherto physically connected has been isolated from one other country. This can be the new way forward at least till the old order is restored. The countries living in isolation and looking for local talent and resources will be the new norm for next few months. An exception to this trend should be IT software services in which I am currently working. If there is any field and set of people which worked extremely hard even during the lockdown, it is the IT field. In fact our challenges went a bit higher by the new work from home models, since we had to manage house work, distractions from working from home away from the working environment of office and deliver the essential services uninterruptedly when there is a complete black out everywhere else. This is my fourth month running, working from home and I am making every effort possible to bring high performance to my official work. Our shelf lives are very short when we are working like that taking risks and bringing value to the client which I am highly appreciative about the way projects are managed.

                 You need to remember that whatever service I am doing above my own self and to the nation is because of the job I am doing and support I am getting from work place. I am a nothing man without my job and I am a nothing man to the nation as well. I couldn’t have run the show with self-respect, without the money I am getting from salary. I couldn’t have kept up the momentum without continuity in the project work.  The concepts which worked in favour of this lockdown phase are globalisation, outsourcing, generosity and business value of a U.S. client. I am very much rooted for the IT jobs outsourced to Indian talent in India. My story is rooted in this concept and everything built by me in the last decade is around that concept. Remember, people like me who can only survive in India failed miserably in IT job search in U.S. in not one but 3 attempts. I just couldn’t find work in U.S. in an IT job. When I work in a day-to-day project job, I work for the good of organisation, home nation, client, client nation. This makes the job that much difficult since all the stakeholders has to be benefitted and I am happy to bear the difficulty for a good cause. Even if a single stakeholder is not doing well, my job is in jeopardy. Hence I work for the good of U.S. even from India, which is why I write about them and meddle in the affairs of rogue nation, time and again purposefully. Hence I vouch for IT jobs manufactured in India which would be mutually beneficial for all the stakeholders and this should be the norm for the next many decades.

                 The response to the pandemic is a big negative that has emerged recently in India and some other countries. I wonder where all the good work that people like me doing is going when there are so many negative results coming. Definitely, the functioning of IT through this pandemic is a positive picture coming out. If we look at one other positive side of the pandemic , it is the way organisations like ISKCON and Akshaya Patra have run their service programmes in the midst of gloom. I always wonder what it takes to run noble causes of such magnitude filling lakhs of stomachs across the country. The message of ISKCON’s Founder-Acharya Srila Prabhupada who envisioned that no one within a 10-mile radius of its center should go hungry is even truer in today’s context. What an empire Srila Prabhupada  has built by his wonderful work. ISKCON has served more than 50 million meals during the lockdown. I personally distributed food given by them to the needy during the down time. Before the pandemic stuck, Akshaya Patra is feeding 1.8 million children every day across 12 states & 2 Union territories of India and 51 kitchens. They also distributed millions of meals and ration kits to the cities and interior locations. I distributed the ration kits given out by them to the financially challenged people.

                 Thus I contributed my part to the work of both these organisations. These huge organisations serving millions of people across the country is a great silver lining of the pandemic response in the country. These organisations are the reason why people did not suffer in silence and protested on the streets demanding food. Things would have gone much more worse in their absence. We all should be in the position to give rather receiving. I am a receiver all my life but this pandemic made me a giver. I donated food and ration kits generously with the help of these organisations. You become an instrument in the donation chain if you become eligible for it. I became eligible through my work and helped these organisations reach many more people. May I stay like a giver for many more days to come. The work of these organisations is highly commendable, positive and we all should be a part of their mission to help many more people. Though abstract, I think their good work and food donations are the reason why there are adequate rains in the country.

                 Moving to the statistics, there are a total of 109.18 lakh infected cases worldwide and 5.21 lakh people dead. In the past week, 13.2 lakh new cases came up and 33 thousand passed away. More than 13 lakh new cases have been registered which is the highest surge in single week so far. The infected persons per week is increasing with each of my successive post. This number is rising alarmingly but should hit the downward slope soon before reaching zero.  U.S.A, Brazil, Russia and India are the ongoing hotspots for the spread of the virus and contributing majorly worldwide. These four countries must be conservative and protective in the response outlook and should save as many lives as possible. These countries must implement tough measures and lock it down completely to arrest the spread of virus till the surge is brought down. Lockdown and other safety measures are highly recommended in these countries for a brief time period. U.S. is breaking all the corona records on the other side reaching new mile stones every now and then. Still the country is reluctant to use masks and people are protesting against imposing the rule. In the midst of this severe virus spread, the people of the country float all the social distancing norms, safety protocols and come out in thousands for mass protests. The president himself presides over huge rallies involving thousands of people and mocking the virus even after taking the rap very badly. This kind of congregation of rule breakers and people with reckless behaviour is what can be termed as an evolution of rogue state which doesn’t follow any standard rules. Great nation(MAGA) to rogue nation – what a descendancy and leadership. See, the wit is diluting the seriousness of this passage and its importance but please look at both separately. This is how rogue people will disturb the serious issues and make them look less important in front of their funniness. That is why roguishness is dangerous and should not be encouraged.

                Coming back to another serious issue, this is the usual time for school re-opening and class commencement in India. The kids are highly unfortunate since usual classes are not permitted and there is no learning for them for the past many months. Unfortunate are the tenth standard students who couldn’t even give their annual exams which are very important in the career of any student. The marks I obtained in my tenth class annual exams remained on my forehead forever. Virus has robbed them of that stamp. Nevertheless, if a mission is to not to let the kids miss their school, then a close alternative is online classes. The students must study through the online classes without getting disturbed because of pandemic. The private school students can afford necessary hardware to go online but it cannot be afforded by government school students. There might not be any online class for Govt. School students. To address this issue, the government must distribute free tablets or smart phones to every govt. secondary school kid and address necessary logistics to run classes online. Smartphone makers must come up with ideal specifications and low price for this segment. Even if the offline classes commence, these smart phones can be of great use to the kids in their learning. This is the problem of every low-income kid – that they don’t have smart phone and can’t study anything. You need to put the best foot forward and everything else will follow suit. It might cost few thousands of crores but well worth in motivating the students.