Indian Express Idea Exchange, March 2012

We waited in the conference hall for a few minutes and gazed at pictures of over dozen renowned personalities from across disciplines before us and we filled with anticipation for the programme that was about to commence. We were told that the objective of this effort was to place a young audience in the company of a pioneer and this session was one with Ms. Naina Lal Kidwai, presently Country Head, HSBC, a model for many of us who aspire to make a name in the fields of finance and banking. She introduced herself and shook hands with each of us and needless to say we felt filled with awe at her spontaneity. She chose to begin the session with her views on Women's Empowerment and Water Conservation and she added a personal touch inserting relevant personal experiences. She was also happy to articulate her views on the current economic predicament of our country as also her prospects. She seemed to exude a natural knack of including us all and the exchange became one where each of us could identify. Infact we all easily shed our inhibitions and freely asked questions, infact, as we later realised, sitting in a group of journalists, editors and experts, we were glad we could grab our space with her! Ms. Kidwai appeared in no hurry and patiently offered detailed answers with examples to our queries.   Ms.Kidwai has many firsts to her credit, first Indian woman to graduate from Harvard Business School, first woman to be hired by Price Waterhouse in India, first woman to lead a foreign bank in India etc. She has a striking personality and a poise which makes her a role-model for many of us. We particularly appreciated that she was consistently candid through the discussion,and made no effort to simply dismiss any thing diplomatically. While answering one of our questions, she said I never thought I was better than someone or that someone was better than me. I thought that I was as good as anyone else! . We felt overwhelmed. We were seeing a real-life application of the values we had been continuously taught at School! Our resolve to strive as she had only got thus reinforced. We were also extremely proud to carry back compliments for our School from the editors and Ms. Kidwai. As reported by Sonali Sharma, class 12 B.       Our interactive session with Naina Lal Kidwai was a specially enlightening one. Barely a week after the budget, there were some very interesting reviews she shared with us. She expressed disappointment for a lack of adequate incentive for the power sector. She said that India had the potential to become a power-surplus country by 2014. However, the hydro-carbon power sector faced major challenges on 2 levels, first, the lack of raw materials. ( The import of coal would ease this .) The second was the distribution of free power. These coupled with the massive leaks of power under the state electricity boards was creating sickness in the sector. The creditworthiness of state boards too needs alleviation. She said that stock market is a major indicator of the budget. She mentioned that there is a great wall of money stashed off-shore ready to be invested in India.and she questioned why this money is unable to find passage back. In this regard, she praised the governments actions on Foreign Direct Investment policies. Among other things, she praised the DTC Bill for it's clarity. On the issue of corruption, she stressed on the need of CAG reports to be quality-audit reports in the public domain. As for tax evasion, she said it is more important to bring black-money stashesd away in Swiss banks back to India and place it in welfare schemes rather than divert energy to catch the corrupt individuals. She cited the UKs agreement with Swiss banks wherein the confidentiality of the Swiss account holders is not disturbed yet, the money will get remitted back to the government.   Ms. Kidwai elaborated for us the concept of e-auctions, which have transparency. Also, she said India needs a better system to manage sick companies like a stronger bankruptcy clause.   When asked what she felt about the global slowdowns impact on India and if we were prepared for another one, she offered a very interesting insight. She said that the slowdown in other countries could in fact benefit India as scarce resources would become cheaply available. When all the economies are competing for the same resources, prices always rise.She also talked of the mobile banking sector which was potentially a bridge to connect the rural remote areas which already have mobile connectivity, and provide them with banking.   Our student, Sonali asked about her experience as a woman pioneer and the difficulties she faced. She described the discrimination and the pressures she combatted as she climbed in her career. She empahsised that had she weakened, it would have made things worse for the other women in the ranks too. She said she felt that an increase in quota was necessary for women, but only initially. Soon the scaffolding becomes redundant as the woman quickly wings. She said that while the sector is now headed with women leaders, rural Indian women still need support for upliftment.   Our student, Ummang, asked her about the scope of alternative energy sources being a part of the energy source in the 2014 energy-surplus India she'd described. She said that while it was difficult for that to happen till 2014, we could aim for at least 20-40%. When asked where the focus of the country should be, she said that wind energy is definitely a growing sector which could yield results. Solar energy is expensive and needs reduction in prices. Also, nuclear technology is much safer and could definitely satisfy Indias growing power needs. As filed by Ms. Pooja Bahl, senior Business Studies' teacher.