So this morning's NYT has a story on billionaire venture capitalist and Sun Co-Founder Vinod Khosla's plans to start a venture capital fund to invest in companies that focus on the poor in India. Khosla knows what he wants, and how to get it, having started SKS Microfinance a few years ago. It lends money to poor women in India.
I was impressed with Khosla's giving but also intrigued by the fact that he made a point of saying that the rich in India simply don't do enough for the poor. This is true, of course. It's one of those things we know of but don't talk about, and it's made more poignant by the fact that while the rich in India do give, they give to temples or religious organizations. I've never understood this form of charity. It's one thing to give to a religious group on the understanding that the money will be spent on educating, feeding, clothing or protecting the less fortunate. It's another thing entirely to give money for the construction of yet another excessively ornate religious structure, whose appearance has less to do with God, and more to do with our self-constructed notion of what would please God.
The article, written by Vikas Bajaj, further points out that Indians give much less as a percentage of the country’s gross domestic product than Americans. 'Moreover, individual and corporate donations account for just 10 percent of the charitable giving in India, compared with 75 percent in the United States and 34 percent in Britain. The balance comes from the government and foreign organizations.'
Khosla isn't the first person to publicly question the state of Indian philathropy, says Bajaj. 'Bill Gates, Microsoft Corp co-founder, who was in China last week with the billionaire Warren E. Buffett, said that he and Mr. Buffett might go to India as part of their campaign to get the very rich to give away half their wealth.'
India now has 69 billionaires, up from 7 in 2002. Of these, the only people I can think of who give publicly to social or charitable concerns are Rata Tata, Azim Premji, and Narayan and Sudha Murthy. Who am I missing? Do the Ambanis or the Mittals spend money on anyone other than themselves, their houses, their daughters' flamboyant weddings, and their art shows? And what of Bollywood? There aren't any actors on the Forbes India rich list, but I assume they have change to spare. Have any one of them made a significant financial contribution to India's poor? This isn't a criticism, it's a question, and if any of you have the answer, please share.
Sun Co-Founder Uses Capitalism to Help Poor.
Share Khosla isn't the first person to publicly question the state of Indian philathropy, says Bajaj. 'Bill Gates, Microsoft Corp co-founder, who was in China last week with the billionaire Warren E. Buffett, said that he and Mr. Buffett might go to India as part of their campaign to get the very rich to give away half their wealth.'
India now has 69 billionaires, up from 7 in 2002. Of these, the only people I can think of who give publicly to social or charitable concerns are Rata Tata, Azim Premji, and Narayan and Sudha Murthy. Who am I missing? Do the Ambanis or the Mittals spend money on anyone other than themselves, their houses, their daughters' flamboyant weddings, and their art shows? And what of Bollywood? There aren't any actors on the Forbes India rich list, but I assume they have change to spare. Have any one of them made a significant financial contribution to India's poor? This isn't a criticism, it's a question, and if any of you have the answer, please share.
Sun Co-Founder Uses Capitalism to Help Poor.
6 comments:
I have heard and read that Sachin Tendulkar gives a lot but he is fiercely private about it and doesn't tell the media.
Feels good to see this blog being active after a long while.
I do think the rich in India give, though maybe not in the public way of Bill Gates and Buffet. I am not a fan of the Ambanis but they definitely do have charities set up...I recall seeing Tina at one that supported art and street kids of which she seemed to be the major patron. It could also be that so much money in India is black, and so it gets given in channels that are not recorded. I also feel that philanthropy is generally a second-generation thing. For first generation wealthy the struggle of gaining their wealth is too raw. It's the second generation who generaly build the philanthropic legacy. By the way, the event in China drew very sparse participation because the big tycoons did not want to publicly face pressure to give away their wealth.
Thanks Anon, good to know. Though I'm not sure I agree with the 'Let not your left hand know what your right hand does' way of thought. Well, in general I do, but in a situation like this, where we need not just our rich but also our middle class to engage with and help out the poor, I think it would help hugely for Sachin to talk about his work. We don't have to talk numbers (hello, Mark Zuckerberg!), but actions that would serve as an example, would, I think, impact people and encourage them to do more.
Paresh, thanks, it's good to be back! My book brought online life to a standstill, but I love my blog as you know, and I want to keep it active.
The Bride, I think you make a great point about the possibility of charitable donations made in 'black' money. I can certainly see that happening. Again, I think it would be useful for such people to find other ways to dispose of such money, and use 'white' money instead to make a donation. This doesn't have to become a show of ostentation, and I understand that many people genuinely wish to do good work quietly. But if you look at the impact Buffet and Gates have had on the attitudes of other billionaires and conglomerations, I think we could agree that some mention of the matter is important and influential.
Well said, Sonia. Good for Khosla.He's absolutely right, there's not enough giving happening.
Coincidentally, there was a comment piece on the Guardian's website yesterday that made the same argument: rich India just doesn't do enough. It was a piece about polio eradication and the work being done by the Gates Foundation. Here's the link
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/oct/11/india-take-responsibility-polio-eradication
The USA seems to operate on two principles: (i) you are free to make as much money as you like and you should not feel guilty about it; and (ii) if you do make a lot of money, then you should give some of it back to the community. The two seem to work together; indeed I would argue that you cannot have the second without the first. Bill Gates' behaviour fits these two principles perfectly and it is in the same tradition as people like Andrew Carnegie etc. etc.
In India, "we" (I mean the intellectual elite) have never accepted the first; not even now. We do everything to discredit the idea of "making money." I won't bother examining why we have this attitude (easy explanation: brahminical arrogance) but it is undeniably there. Then why complain that the Indian rich don't do enough for the poor?
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