12 January 2009

Few snakes are out - World Bank again

The recent mayhem of Satyam's Ex-chairman caused a lot of worries. There are heated debates in Times Now, CNN IBN, NDTV and NDTV Profit. The reporters are doing a decent job in trying to bring the facts to the viewers. It is painful, alarming, disgusting and never-again accident. The "so-called" corporates are trying to prove that they are on par with politicians. The politicians do vote bank politics to give power in order to earn money. The corporates are clever enough to avoid a redundant step of trying to capture the power. The news on Satyam have not dried up yet and in fact there are lot of developments such as grilling of "ex" Chairman, MD and CFO.

Now, few more snakes are out of the park. Again, World Bank has opened its mouth saying that it has barred few more companies. The companies are Satyam, Wipro and Megasoft. All the companies, at some point of time, were trying to give "improper benefits" to bank's staff. World bank has started to dig the mess to find some of its employees have illegal partnerships with above stated companies.

If you are curious to know more about the story, here are the links.
Wipro Story
All Stories

Let us give some time for the corporates to give some meaningful and sensible answers. If I am not wrong, one of the executives of Wipro was trying to justify the deed by conveying that Wipro does not have more exposure (less than 1 million $$$ aggregated revenues for eight years) to World Bank. This clearly shows that Wipro neither cares about its credibility nor its investors. At this point of time, I would like to believe and hope that the bad news (developments of yet another fiasco) of Wipro ends here. Because, even in the case of Satyam, everything started with World Bank and the end is terrible.

So, at this point of time, my question is "who's next".

2 comments:

Rajkumar Pandian said...

Lakshmi,
I don't quite agree with you regarding the following points.

1) The reporters are doing a decent job - I would say "reporters" do not REPORT stories, but they COOK stories.All I see them doing is screaming out as if the world has come to an end.The reporters who report do not know nothing about corporate governance, economics, shares or anything for that matter. All they report is THEIR own perception of the happenings.Ofcourse, exceptions are there.

2) The development of Wipro ends here - Why say that?. They must have their own reasons for doing that. If Wipro says, their business with world bank is less than 1$ million, why try to woo the staff of world bank? They have billion dollar customers.I'm sure the businesses would continue.

Take the story of Reliance and Dhrubai Ambani. I have never heard of worst accusations than what Ambani had faced.Still Reliance is growing.No body questions the ethics of the company.Their shares are a pride possession.

These stories are not going to end.This is the way the economy WILL BE.You will have bail outs, success stories, bankruptcy stories etc. The Chaos theory will work.

Found this http://www.snappingturtle.net/jmc/tmblog/archives/004587.html

Lakshmi said...

Response to point #1:
After Satyam's fiasco, I have been watching CNN-IBN, NDTV Profit, NDTV and Times Now. Apart from the corner cases, I feel that the media has greatly helped to bring the facts to the notice of people. Now, the regulators and govt are forced to take initiatives. Think about the scenario where the information is hidden from the investors/stakeholders. I still remember the day the news broke out, CNN-IBN interviewed a campus recruit in its prime time. You and I know the pain of being recruited in campus, given an offer and waiting for joining data. I quite agree that, the media are sensationalizing the news. That is ok, as long as it is not misleading.

Response to point #2:
I meant to say, "the news about Wipro ends here" as India heavily depends on Indian IT sector. I do want to see 3rd and 4th places becoming void. Both of them have substantial business.

My point about other companies that were barred was "they have lost ethics and governance". They were trying to talk in money by losing their credibility. They are thinking that the investors are only looking for profits. They can been proved wrong by nature any growth in illegal and unethical way will not be a sustainable one.

I quite agree with your perspective and question "Why should they give ***something*** they the business cost worth 1 million. Interesting question.. I am not sure whether someone will that company will answer your question, however the time will do answer your question.