INTERVIEW : ARJUN MALHOTRA

Harness the potential of the young

Posted: Saturday, Jan 06, 2007 at 0017 hrs IST
Updated: Saturday, Jan 06, 2007 at 0017 hrs IST

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: Part of the famous team that founded HCL in a garage in 1975, Arjun Malhotra had a long association with HCL, taking over its US operations in 1989 before stints in Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand. His entrepreneurial spirit still alive, he founded Techspan, with funding from Goldman Sachs and Walden International. In 2003, it merged with another IT-based financial services company Headstrong with Malhotra taking over as the CEO. He spoke to Gaurav Bhagowati on entrepreneurship and business in India

Everyone's talking about a Resurgent India these days? What are your views on this new India going ahead in, say, the next 5 years?

If you look at our demographics with 54% of the population under the age of 24, our GDP growth or how our consumer market is growing we do have some interesting years ahead. If we can harness this young brainpower and use them in the knowledge industries coming up we could well become a World Economic Power.

However, a lot of work has to be done. I believe that if we focus on infrastructure, education and healthcare, we would automatically start solving a lot of the problems of poverty and the fact that large chunks of our people have not felt the positive impact of the digital economy. I believe with focus and dedication this can happen. The reason is that people seem to want to do something for the country. I think this energy if harnessed appropriately and channeled in to the right direction will take this country forward.

You're the quintessential face of the Indian enetrpreneur, since the time you founded HCL “from a garage” and then Techspan, which later merged with Headstrong. What or who is the face of Indian entrepreneuship today? Where is Indian entrepreneurship going given the current restrictive environment?

I would not call the current environment “restrictive”. There are some restrictions but restrictive was what we had in the 60s, 70s and 80s. I should know. We started HCL in 1975 and I remember what restrictions meant. Add to that the fact that we were restricted by our conditioning (security of a job and no business background). And then we were restricted by the image the world had of Indians then. Add to that the restriction of resources...

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