Address by

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Yeejleer³e He´ewÐeesefiekeÀer mebmLeeve ieeBOeerveiejIndian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar

July 22, 2012

Convocation Address

by

N. R. Narayana Murthy

Chairman Emeritus

Infosys Limited, Bangalore, India

Being a Patriot

Dr. Ramesh Mashelkar, Dr. Sudhir Jain, members of the

governing board, members of the Senate, faculty, staff,

students, parents of the graduating students, guests and

most, importantly, graduating students, my sincere thanks to

you all for giving me this unique opportunity of speaking at

this first convocation. First convocation is a historic occasion

and marks the realization of dream, commitment, innovation,

and hard work of the founding fathers of this budding

institution. We must all be grateful to them for their

contribution. I feel honored to be here today with two

extraordinary individuals connected with this institution. The

Chairman is a unique individual. Even if you subtract from

him, his FRS, his scholarship and his achievements in

institution building, in my opinion, he remains a great

individual. He is a role model for me and many others for

positivity, patriotism and professionalism. He makes

everybody in his company an inch taller and a smile happier.

Your Director is an academic and educational administrator

par excellence. Most professors that I know at IIT Kanpur talk

about his excellence in scholarship. I worked with him when

he was the Dean at IIT Kanpur in fund raising from the alumni.

I believe his work at IIT Kanpur in fund raising is a model for

every professional engaged in development.

Congratulations to the passing out students. In the US, this

occasion is called Commencement because you are

commencing your journey of translating your education to the

benefit of the world. May every one of you realize your

potential fully and wholly to make this country and the world a

better place for all of us. You have received an excellent

education from your professors and staff. I am in full

agreement with that. Therefore, I will speak on another

important topic. That is, becoming a patriotic Indian.

When I left IIT Kanpur after my graduate studies and went

abroad to Paris in the early seventies, India was seen by most

foreigners as a condemned and pitiable land of dogma, empty

vanity, filth, poverty, illiteracy, low achievement and diseases.

You pass out at a time when India is the cynosure of all eyes.

The world expects India to be one of the leaders to solve

global problems of politics and economics. India sits at the

high table in most major multilateral deliberations. What

India says is heard with attention and seriousness. Unlike me

when I was young, you have that rare opportunity and

extraordinary responsibility of strengthening this new-found

respectability.

What is patriotism? To me, patriotism is not just singing our

national anthem or draping myself in our national flag. They

are important and necessary but not sufficient. To me,

patriotism is about working ethically and wholeheartedly in

our chosen sphere to enhance public good. What do I mean by

that? It means working efficiently, swiftly, effectively,

honestly and in a co-operative manner with the interfaces of

the state and central governments to make our public

governance strong, robust and enduring. It is about

conducting ourselves in a manner that enhances the

confidence of our next generation in our public institutions. It

is about making the next generation proud of our country

through our actions. It is also about enhancing the prestige of

India abroad through our performance on international

platforms.

Naturally, you will ask what you, a first-class engineer, can do

in this gigantic task of improving public governance. After all,

being engineers, there is not much interaction you would have

with the state agencies unless you are a civil servant. Let me

suggest a few things that you can do to make India stronger.

You have to develop high aspirations in matters of public

good. Aspirations build civilizations. You must aspire that

India becomes the best-administered country in the world,

and a model of fairness, transparency and accountability. You

want every Indian to have the best standard of living in the

world. You want India to be the largest exporter in the world.

You want India to have a seat on the Security Council. You

want India to have the best educational system in the world so

that every other nation must want to send their young men

and women to India for education like the US is today. You

want India to have the best defense forces in the world. I can

go on and on. You get the point, right? These may appear

impossible but it is better to aspire to plausibly impossible

stuff than convincingly possible stuff.

These things do not happen because of mere speeches and

slogans. They happen because of performance. Unless you

translate your aspirations to actions they do not mean a thing.

I want you to remember that performance leads to

recognition. Recognition leads to respect. Respect leads to

power. Therefore, my friends, there is only one way to make

India a powerful nation. That is through performance.

Aspirational performance requires that you create

aspirational targets, and work hard, fast, smart, honest and in

a disciplined manner over a long period of time to achieve

these targets. Remember that discipline, speed of decision

making, and velocity of action are necessary attributes for

high performance. You have excellent role models in such

tasks in fellow IITian like Satyendra Dubey.

You may not always be able to add any direct value to this

effort of raising the quality of public governance. But, if you

etch such high aspirations in your mind, you will conduct

yourself as a high class citizen and do the best you can to help

and influence others around you to make these aspirational

dreams a reality. Such high aspirations build up your

character. They make you a better human being.

Better performance comes from benchmarking with people,

organizations and nations that are better than us. When

Indian companies started exporting they realized that

benchmarking with the global best was the sure way to

succeed in the global market and to compete with the global

best even in the domestic market. This brought better respect

to India abroad and better value to the domestic customers.

Therefore, please benchmark with the global best in whatever

you do.

Once you start benchmarking and competing with the global

best, the next step for you is to aim to be the leader there. You

become a leader by creating a set of next practices. Next

practices happen because of innovation. Let me demystify

innovation for you. Every day, in whatever you do, just ask

how you can make it cheaper, faster and better. I believe that

innovation must become part of the DNA of every

organization from the janitor to the Chairman.

These days, most aspirational tasks are huge and need team

work. Team work requires you to rise above gender, caste,

religion, race, regionalism and nationality. To do so, you must

subordinate your ego and eliminate bias by deciding every

issue using data and facts in an environment of courtesy and

dignity, openness, fairness, transparency, accountability and

meritocracy. You have to be generous and share credit with

other members of the team. You have to create trust and

confidence in them through your actions.

We, Indians, are not known for humility. Even the famous

Persian logician and writer, Al Barouni, has commented on it

after spending 32 years in India in the tenth century AD and

holding discussions with several Indian pundits. You must

change this lacuna in our psyche. Humility requires grace,

courtesy and generosity when you are powerful. That is the

best way to win over your critics.

We are also the most thin-skinned people. We have to learn to

take criticisms objectively. Therefore, when somebody

criticizes you or India, do not lose temper. Sit down with him

or her, ask for data and facts, and argue rationally. Hold the

argument in a courteous and agreeable manner. That is the

best way to win over your critics. If the other party has better

data than you, accept their argument, learn from them and

become a better-informed person.

Some of you will work in international teams. To be successful

in such efforts, you have to communicate what you want to

achieve clearly and unambiguously. You must learn to commit

to specific quantifiable targets. You must learn to bring bad

news to the table early and pro-actively. You have to embrace

the universal values of discipline, openness to new ideas,

meritocracy, honesty, courtesy, fairness, accountability and

respect for other cultures.

Remember that this institution has given you a passport to

better respect and prosperity for yourself. The hallmark of a

civilized individual is to show gratitude to those that have

made you more than what you were. Therefore, please

contribute generously to make this institution stronger to

serve even a larger number of smart people like you.

Remember the words of John Kennedy who said that a society,

that cannot help many who are poor, cannot save the few who

are rich. Your betterment lies in the betterment of the entire

society. Therefore, please contribute in kind and cash to bring

smile to the poorer sections of the society around you.

Let me now move to a very important responsibility of yours in

showing your patriotism. Democracy does not stop at holding

fair and free elections once in five years. It requires electing

merited candidates who will show courage and character to

make every sacrifice required to legislate and govern

honestly, smartly, swiftly and with integrity of thought and

purpose. Democracy succeeds only if we create strong and

enduring institutions of the state, and effective watchdogs of

the civil society. Therefore, please register to vote. Spend

some time in evaluating candidates, overcoming biases of

caste and religion. Chose the candidates solely based on their

performance. Please go to the polling booth on the voting day,

and cast your vote. Participate in public movements that fight

injustice, bigotry, nepotism and corruption. This is your

sacred duty, one that has to be discharged mandatorily if you

want to be a patriotic Indian and if you want a better India.

Finally, remember that a happy mind achieves bigger things

than otherwise. Therefore, have fun, be happy, and make

people around you happy. The other day, a colleague of mine

passed on a short piece on success. I do not know who the

author is. I want to share it with you.

To laugh often and much;

To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of

children;

To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the

betrayal of false friends;

To appreciate beauty and to find the best in others;

To leave the world a bit better whether by a good child, a

garden patch or a redeemed social condition;

To know even one life has breathed easier because you have

lived.

This is to have succeeded.

I am sure that every one of you will be successful.

Thank you.

Yeejleer³e He´ewÐeesefiekeÀer mebmLeeve ieeBOeerveiejIndian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar