T N Ninan: When under fire

WEEKEND RUMINATIONS

The pattern of responses to the IIM fee cut issue has some interesting features. Some of the leading lights of industry, in their capacity as chairmen of the governing bodies of these premium institutes, have chosen to bend in the face of an intransigent human resource development ministry.

Whether it is S M Datta at Bangalore or Yogi Deveshwar at Calcutta or AC Muthiah at Kozhikode (to take three examples), worthy gentlemen with personal reputations built up over the years have chosen to not take a stand, although they have nothing to lose other than their reputations.

Even the redoubtable N R Narayana Murthy seemed initially to be willing to go along with the ministry before taking a more carefully balanced position, and now IIM-Ahmedabad is leading the fight.

These gentlemen have no monetary stakes in the issue, the ministry can do nothing to harm them in other spheres, and there should therefore be little to come in the way of their deciding to take a stand "" if they believe that to be the right course of action.

This last point is not clear, of course, and it is entirely possible that seasoned managers of businesses in the Indian environment know the folly of taking on the government and realise that this could be counter-productive for the institutes.

In other words, discretion is indeed the better part of valour. To underline the point, it's worth quoting someone who seems to have imbibed fully the government's capacity for arbitrary power: V S Pandey, illustrious joint secretary in the ministry and its representative at several of the institutes: "Sir, this is no joke, sir, you are dealing with central government-established institution, sir, only one loser, your society and your organization...We aren't bothered by public opinion...Sir, don't force the government in a corner. It is a humble request I am making."

What makes the pattern interesting is that those who have much more to lose than part-time members of the institutes' governing bodies, are willing to take a stand.

The IIM governing body may have opted to play along in some form, as in the case of Calcutta, but the Calcutta faculty is fighting it out in court. Students, who it would seem have everything to gain from the government's position, have figured out that what the ministry intends is not really in their interest, and have been willing to speak out "" although most of them will end up being little more than careerists in a year or two.

Are these foolhardy people who don't understand what they are doing and who they are taking on, or do they know a more fundamental truth, that when something is worth preserving, it is worth fighting for, and that there are limits to the government's arbitrariness? Or is it the case that if the government does play its hand in the manner spelt out by Mr Pandey, both faculty and students can tell the government where it gets off by simply moving on to other pastures that exist for them? In other words, India's professional elite now has choices and therefore greater freedom for civic action?

The third set of responses is from Murli Manohar Joshi's colleagues. Almost everyone acknowledges privately that Dr Joshi's senior Cabinet colleagues feel he is wrong or ill-advised, but no one is willing to say so. Delegations have met the prime minister, but he has kept his counsel.

Is it that collective responsibility in the Cabinet system works against internal correctives when something gets out of hand, or is public face what comes in the way and wheels will move privately before too much damage is done?

There are no definitive answers just now, but intelligent guesswork points mostly in one direction. And if evidence were needed that the government's move on fees is in fact going to work out counter-productive, it is provided by IIM-Calcutta's move to charge more from companies that wish to recruit its students.

Companies too have a choice, after all, and if some other business school offers management graduates of comparable quality without a high recruitment fee, they will go there and IIM-C will be the loser. Before very long, market pressure will force IIM-C to backtrack, unless it can offer clearly superior graduates-which in turn becomes difficult because the institute now has less money to use.