Chief Guest Ms. Anu Aga's Convocation Address
IRMA Convocation 2015
Chairman, Members of the IRMA Board, Director, Faculty, Staff and Media, parents and my dear students, congratulations to all those who have graduated today. I thank my friend Deep Joshi and the Institute of Rural Management for inviting me today for the 34th convocation address. Ever since I came yesterday, I fell in love with your beautiful green Campus and your warm hospitality. Thank you.
The Institute has pioneered management practices for our rural sector. It is a welcome change to come across students who have made unconventional career choices specially at a time when the media discussion tend to be about the pay-packets that the graduates from the top management institutes have bagged. So it is refreshing to be among young people who have opted for a cause that deals with the real India and I hope these concerns never happens and you stop coming here because, and keep on to your ideals. I hope that happens. Later, I would like to tell you about ‘Teach For India’ which also attracts youngsters who are not running after perks and pay but want a deeper involvement with social issues. We are all aware of the world moving towards urbanization and India also is moving in the same direction. Could it be because the villages in India have remained under invested and in spite of the recovery barring a few States no one has really bothered about improving life in our villages. Is life in the villages in many parts of our country so miserable that they are willing to accept that difficulties and displacement that migration down swing them. Gandhi Ji, is perhaps the only leader who consistently and strongly advocated that India should begin from its villages to develop them into self governance and self reliant and collaborative community.
At a loss, we in India have ignored his advice and find it easier to make his statues and put him on a pedestal. I do not want to say any more about rural issues about which you people know much more than me. I would like to speak about the challenges I have faced in life. This is not with the intension of showing off but to make you aware that nobody can be spared from difficult time and unless we face them and deal with them we could end up being miserable. I would also like to speak about the inequity in education, an area about which I have some experience and how each of us can contribute towards resolving them. All of you present are fortunate because you come from families that valued education and were open to the idea of children pursuing their own dream. Thank you such parents.
I need not tell you that in India, there are many intelligent but poor children who never had an opportunity to prove their worth in spite of the right to education, the land mark legislation that has increased enrollment in primary education. Fifty per cent of students drop-out by class V, five. It may be because the parents need them to work to supplement the meager family income or find schools totally irrelevant. Only about ten per cent of children in India are lucky enough to get to college and you are from that fortunate ten per cent. For the girls present here, your families did not see you as destined only for domestic life and to spend time behind walls, they wanted you to study, to be independent and to create your own life. You had an added generational advantage.
Let me tell you a little bit about my childhood, so that you understand what I am trying to convey. I had two older brothers and though academically I did better, I was not encouraged to pursue a career. We owned a small family business and both my brothers were constantly reminded that they would have to join and look after that business whereas, I was repeatedly told that however good I may in studies, my main aim in life was to marry bear children and bring them up. In my childhood the different messages were not just about career choices but they also decided which feeling was okay and which was not. If I ever showed anger, I was scolded and reminded that I will have to live with my husband and in-laws and should learn to be submissive and obedient but if I cried or showed sadness, I got a lot of sympathy and attention. My brothers were allowed to show their anger, but were not suppose to cry. If they cried, my father called them CCs.
In those days, girls were brought up for their afilliative needs, which means the ability to get along with people and boys for their achievement, which meant they were expected to be ambitious and successful at work. I am sure things have changed radically from my time and you have far greater choices, is that true, Ya. Since, I saw all my friends brought up with similar restrictive messages, I did not realize there limitations. I was lucky in marrying a wonderful man who encouraged me to be myself and pushed me to be a career woman. That means, I woke up from a day dream and planned my future and reached where I am today. I would be dishonest and sensationalizing if I described my life in that manner. When I looked back I tend to agree with Woody Allen’s observation. If you want to hear God’s laugh, tell him about your future plans. I am not trying to dismiss the value of planning, but I am asking you to consider the part played by chance or destiny in our lives. As I mentioned in the beginning, I have not studied Sociology, urban and rural issues and hence I cannot tell you anything which you already do not know. But there is one thing that binds all human beings irrespective of who we are and from where we come from and that is our personal experiences and what it has taught us.
Let me share with you three major challenges of life and how I dealt with it. The first major challenge came my way in 1980 when my husband Rohinton had a massive heart attack and a large part of his heart was damaged. We went to the UK for his Bypass surgery and on the 2nd day he had a stroke. Though, he was a brilliant man , he could not recognize me. He forgot to read and write. This challenge taught me three lessons. Doctors have said that my husband would never fully recover. But with determination and grip Rohinton wrote A, B, C, D ; 1, 2, 3, 4 and his right-side was paralyzed and he wanted to tie his shoe lace . The physio-therapist said tie a big bow on your thigh and after a month he will be able to tie the shoe lace. He tied the bow the whole night and the next morning he tied the shoe lace, and within two years he became his usual self, took delegations abroad and authored a book. The lesson was never take an expert opinion as final but have faith in yourself.
As parents, we give great importance to education believing nobody can take our knowledge away. Rohinton’s stroke was a humbling experience and taught us that a small blood clot can wipe away all our knowledge and intelligence. So the second important lesson was nothing in life is permanent and don’t be arrogant about your intelligence. The third lesson was to take care of our health and never take it for granted. My husband was a workaholic, smoke and love food which was unhealthy for him. From a young age we need to nurture and invest in our health. Success at work should not demand a disproportional price where we end up neglecting our health and our important relationships. The lesson learnt was about living one’s life with a sense of balance and as Deep just reminded me and enjoy human wellbeing. After we returned from UK, well wishers suggested that I, take interest in our Company Thermax which was then a Private Limited Company.
I worked for five years in the Human Resource Department and when my boss decided to leave, I was made the Head of HR. Here was the chance playing its role in my life, though by training I am a Social Worker, destiny took me to the Corporate world. Our two children Meher and Kurush studied Engineering in the U.K. and later both decided to join the business as Trainee Engineers. Meher and her husband Firosh were sent to England to turn around a small business unit which was not doing well. Four years later when Meher was expecting her first child I went to England to be with her. In those days a HR was used to focus on soft human issues and I had not bothered to learn about business. I had decided that when I get back from the U.K. I, would come out of HR and learn hard core business issues. After my grand son born I returned to India after six months. My husband was delighted to have me back and had driven from Pune to Mumbai to receive me but before he could come to the airport he had a massive heart attack and died. As soon as I landed, instead of my husband being there to receive me I was told that he was no more.
In 1995, a year before Rohinton’s passing away our Company Thermax had gone Public. Two days after his death the Board met and decided that I should be the Executive Chairperson. I had not planned for this day. It was a very difficult period as I was missing my husband terribly and felt most inadequate to assume this responsibility. I kept devaluing myself by saying the only reason I was given this position was because the family owns 62% of the Shares. The second challenge I had to face at this stage was I had a choice, either to feel helpless, wallow in self pity, allowing myself adequacy to go or to hold myself together and take charge of my life. Soon after I took over as Chairperson, the Indian economy went through a down turn and our performance kept deteriorating and our publicly listed share which was at one time 400 came down to 35 rupees. News papers said that I am likely to sell the business and settle abroad. Little did they realized that I am not a quitter and considered the business as a family legacy. The terrible results were a wakeup call to do something drastic.
I convinced the Board to hire a consulting company to help us turn around. There was great resistance from our senior executives saying that I should have faith that when things improve and as soon as the economy picked up Thermax would do better. I think, men find it difficult to seek help. Perhaps, it comes in the way of their macho image. Have you ever seen on a road if you don’t know where to go a woman will come out and ask someone and the man will look at a map and now a days the GSP or whatever that is. Thermax had to exit from its non-core businesses which were not profitable and which consumed a lot of management time. In the businesses we decided to keep, we brought in operational efficiency. We reconstituted the entire board perhaps at that time, the first time in India requesting the old members to step down, brought in robust performance culture and rekindled innovation and the customer focus. Those were tough challenges but thanks to the help given by many people, committed team work of our employees , support from the family and with destiny on our side Thermax turned around in 2000 and 2001.
In 2004, I decided to retire and the Board and the Board selected my daughter Mehar who is a Chemical Engineer as the Chairperson. Why did I decide to retire when the Company was doing well and I was enjoying the media glare. Being from the HR background and having experienced the trauma of dropped at succession, I wanted a smooth well planned succession. I wanted to change gears and move to social work while I had the energy. After all, I am a trained social worker. Third was a ego need. I did not want to undignify myself. I have seen many people, specially men stay on till they are 80, 85 and all around asking “Eh Buddha Kabhi Jayega”. If you ask me what was the third and the most difficult challenge in my life, my response would be to learn to accept death and come to terms with it. Like most people, I imagined that death is something that happens to others.
I was paranoid about death and when any one ever said anything unpleasant, I would touch wood. In the days, when there was no Express way, between Mumbai and Puna and my husband and I would travel by the old road and if the word death was mentioned I would make him stop the car find the tree and touch it. Today, I am aware that even if I carry the entire forest with me, I cannot change my destiny. My first encounter with a death of a dear one was when I lost my second daughter who was just five months old after a brief undiagnosed illness. I am not a religious person, but faith in someone up there helped me to overcome it. My husband’s death was extremely painful but I found it most difficult when my son Kurush was killed in a car accident, fourteen months after my husband passed away. In fact, the pain which I felt when my husband died receded into insignificance compared to how I felt when my son died, he was only 25 with his entire life ahead of him. For years, I had heard of a Buddhist meditation called Vipassana. It is for ten days and you are not allowed to talk or read. My husband used to say he would love to see me quiet for such a long time. Deaths have created a deep void in my life and I decided to attend the meditation programme. Since you cannot distract yourself, you are forced to turn inwards and tap your inner resources and strengths.
I have found meditating on a daily basis has been most helpful for me. I realized God is not partial to any human being and all of us sitting in this room, and I repeat, all of us sitting in this room will die. It is inevitable. What we do not know is when, where and how we will die. It is unpredictable. The sun rises and sets each day and we do not cry when the sun sets because we have accepted this natural process. Similarly, all of us are born and have to leave this earth, but since we have not accepted this inevitable process we refer death as a tragedy. For me, tragedy in life is a failure to get along with the living, investing in ourselves and relationships that matter. We live with untested myths like young should not suffer and die. One visit to a Pediatric hospital will make us realize death can knock on our doors at any time. Once you accept that no living person can escape death you value the time that you have on this earth and life becomes full of meaning. I also realize that after the death of a dear one, pain is inevitable but suffering is optional. Suffering happens when you keep asking why did this happen to me. `Why’ has no answer and adds to our misery. Dealing with death, releases a lot of energy and you have the confidence that if you can come to terms with the most difficult phenomenon you are ready to face any challenge in life. Youngsters like you who have glorious life stretched out in front of you might find my talk about death morbid. Why harp on this unpleasant subject on such a happy occasion.
You are old and ready to go but we have a full life ahead of us. Just to tell you that even at your age it is helpful to realize that loss, separation and failure are built into our life and at some stage we have to face them. In fact, everything that happens in our lives, every so called misfortune, every rejection or loss teaches us very profound learning provided we allow our lives to be our best teacher. As human beings we have the ability to convert our struggle to grace or wallow in bitterness but choice is entirely ours. My late son was very keen that a part of our personal wealth be used for social causes. He had been abroad for eight years and was uncomfortable with poverty. I wonder, whether we who live in India become insensitive for sufferings all around us. After his death, I was searching for a credible NGO and came across Shahin Mistry who had started Akansha in Mumbai.
Shahin had lived abroad for eighteen years and when she returned to India was acutely troubled by the poor children living in the Mumbai slums. Akansha started Centers where the underprivileged children who study in Municipal and low income Private Schools but learn very little, come for two and a half hours and learn English, Maths, Values and have some fun. I was struck by the idealism and the zeal of Shahin and decided to support some of Akansha’s Educational Centres and helped them spread to Pune. Eventually, I joined the Akansha Board. At the Board, while reviewing the impact we had on the children, we could see that we were able to enhance the children’s self confidence but could not substantially impact their academic due to limited time available. In 2010 to provide focus to the Company’s CSR initiative in the area of education, we established the Thermex Foundation. Akansha decided to adopt English medium Municipal Schools in Mumbai and Pune and over time close the Centres to maximize our impact. As a Public, Private Partnership Thermex Foundation along with Akansha singed M.O.U.s with the Pune and the neighbouring Pimpri, Chinchwad Municipal Corporation to run Government Schools. Today, our Foundation financially supports seven schools in Pune and will continue adding every year.
Two batches of children appeared in the X Std. exams in 2013 & 14 and I am delighted to share that not only did every one child pass but 70% got First class and 22% Distinction. As you can see, Shain did not stop with Akansha with an audacious goal of providing quality education to every child in India she was instrumental in creating teach for India which is a modeled after teach for America with a vision to bring about systemic change in our education system. She asked if I would partner her and I readily agreed. TFI is a nationwide movement with the vision that one day all children in India will attain excellent education. TFI’s model has two parts a Fellowship and the Alumni movement. The Fellowship is a two year full time commitment which involves teaching in Municipal under-resource private schools. Fellows are recruited from a large pool of applications.
Typically, we take less than 7% of applications making a thorough rigorous selection process. Teaching in India is not an aspirational profession. If you can’t get anything better you become a teacher, specially a School teacher. We want to change that. Right at the beginning, Fellows go through a intensive residential five week training programme. During the two years, the Fellows will get supervision, coaching and ongoing training. The second part of the model is the Alumni movement which will bring about the systemic changes to reach our vision. It is our aspiration that the Alumni join different sectors like Business, Education, Law, Politics and all focus on bringing about educational equity from the career that they choose. TFI is currently operating in 6 cities has 900 Fellows teaching 30,000 children in 2068 Government and low income private schools. What is wonderful is that 60 to 65% who pass out do not go for pay and perk but remain in the social sector. Educating people is not an idealistic pursuit any more. If our country has to develop and be the economic power house where jobs are created with significant improvement in the National output the number of trained people that we need is mind-bogging. The unfortunate factors that we don’t have enough educated or skilled people in our country. Even sadder is the fact that the children we churn out from our schools are not at all equipped in terms of requisite knowledge or skills required today. The Programme for International Students’ Assessment (PISA) which was conducted in 2009 ranks India 73rd out of 74 countries and Kirkistan was the only country worst than us. How does it make you feel?
What did India do, did we say we will do something and improve? We said, we will no more take part in this PISA because the questions asked are not relevant to our children. Annual status of education report are such which is the most widely covered national survey across rural India and it is facilitated by the Pratham Foundation. It has brought out that quality of education is not improving but deteriorating. A child in Grade-V cannot read the Grade-II text book and only 27% can do basic subtraction. It is this dismal situation that Teach For India is trying to address. Building more schools, persuading children to come to schools, providing adequate conditions for them to stay in schools. These are all the important but will be pointless without improving the quality of education. Without upgrading the knowledge and skill levels of our teachers and making learning fun so that children want to learn. At a time when nation choose to define themselves through the GDPs and individuals through their Net worth the TFI Fellows want to define themselves through the significance they made and reach out to the fellow human beings in need.
As I said earlier, you are among the fortunate’s who could study and be a member of one of the prestigious Institutes of India. I would very much want you to be part of the 2nd Independence movement in India whereby, we fight against ignorance, poverty, prejudice and insensitivity. I invite you to join the TFI movement to try form India. At some point in your early career would you like to consider at least two years of your lives to immerse yourself in an experience that can really help in being in touch with the deprived children of our country. It is an opportunity to transform you and the lives of people. You may want to work in the rural sector; I believe you spent at least two months in the rural sector and know how terrible the education is. Through your experience with TFI you can affect the rural sector. I have learnt that each of us has two sides within us, the ordinary and the extra-ordinary. Tell me how many of you here are extra-ordinary. Put-up your hands … pause now hesitating ha, it is so much easy to define yourself as mediocrity because then you don’t have to push yourselves. You can remain ordinary. Gandhi Ji, was an ordinary man but the minute he got in touch with the extra-ordinariness, we know what happened. So, I congratulate each of you and wish you all extra-ordinary and fulfilling lives. I would like to end with my favorite story from Vipassana called swimo-logy. How many of you, have done Vipassana.
Oh, quite a few parents ha, but no students ha. OK. There was a young Professor who went on a long voyage and being a Professor he took stacks and stacks of books with him and there was an old sailor who was very impressed because he was uneducated, he was illiterate and he told the Professor on this long voyage will you teach me. Professor said of course, so the first day the old sailor comes to the Professor and the Professor says do you know what Geology is ?, Geology, never heard of it. Professor says you live on this earth and you don’t know Geology, 25% of your life is over. The next day, again the sailor comes and the Professor says do you know what the Oceanography is ?, no, never heard of it. You are a sailor and you live on the sea, you don’t know what is oceanography? 50% of your life is over. The third day again the meteorology, you don’t know the sky and the stars? 75% of your life is over. So the poor sailor goes back to his room very dejected. The fourth day, the sailor comes running and asks the Professor do you know swimo-logy, the Professor says no, what’s that, sailor says the ship is sinking and 100% of your life is over. So, unless, unless, you learn the art of living and which is swim-ology 100% of your life is useless.
Thank you very much.
