High Five India ft. Professor Debashis Chatterjee

[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to India a story in the making. My guest today is a man who harped various professions, ultimately to realize that his true calling is thought leadership. Professor Devashis Chatterjee, the first generation longest serving director of IIM.

[00:00:22] Professor Chatterjee was in London for a conference on globalizing the Indian thought. That's when we on India a story in the making caught up with him. He even brought me beautiful spices from the very land of spices in India, Kerala, Cozy Cold. And what a coincidence the interview was held in the Cinnamon Club in London.

[00:00:45] I spoke to him about, is it India's century and why? And from that fascinating interview, I bring to you High Five India, a rapid fire section.

[00:01:02] We have a high five section, Professor, where I will ask you five rapid fire questions. You end up with a high five with me.

[00:01:11] High five, like this?

[00:01:11] Like this, like.

[00:01:13] Okay, all right.

[00:01:13] India for you in one word?

[00:01:16] Invincible.

[00:01:18] Explain, please.

[00:01:20] How can you defeat something that is not fighting you, that's always embracing you?

[00:01:28] How can you beat somebody who is not opposing you, who is taking you in?

[00:01:32] This country has assimilated everything and yet remained resilient as one nation.

[00:01:37] United Europe is not a reality. United India is.

[00:01:41] What is the one thing about India that the world doesn't get?

[00:01:46] It's idiosyncrasies.

[00:01:49] There's a method in our madness.

[00:01:52] And that method one doesn't get.

[00:01:54] One only gets the CNN version of the madness.

[00:01:58] The method is that when a democracy of 1.4 people, billion people are jostling to arrive at a certain consensus, there will be noise.

[00:02:09] There will be fire.

[00:02:13] But we are doing it together.

[00:02:15] And so value for many and value for money are two different things.

[00:02:20] We are trying to build a consensus around so many different kinds of degrees of aspiration.

[00:02:27] And we are doing it for years and years.

[00:02:31] What is the one thing that India is doing right?

[00:02:33] And what is the one thing that it needs to still get?

[00:02:38] To be sensitive to its ecocentric view of life.

[00:02:43] None of the egocentric view of life.

[00:02:45] We are not a nation built on arms and power and economies.

[00:02:52] We are a nation built on relationships.

[00:02:56] And we believe that this is one thing that the world has to learn from us.

[00:03:01] The multi-alignment of India's geopolitical with every power that there is.

[00:03:07] The ability to get along with everyone, including China.

[00:03:12] And Russia.

[00:03:13] And Russia.

[00:03:14] And America.

[00:03:15] At the same time.

[00:03:16] It's an incredible power.

[00:03:18] I think India is doing it right.

[00:03:20] Our foreign policy is incredibly ecocentric.

[00:03:26] Okay.

[00:03:27] You're a big exponent of thought leadership.

[00:03:33] From Gita, or from all that you have read,

[00:03:36] what is it that the Indian ethos provides in terms of leadership thought to the world,

[00:03:43] which we don't have in the Western concept?

[00:03:48] When the work is done,

[00:03:53] the followers say that we have achieved it.

[00:03:58] And the leader remains invisible.

[00:04:02] A leader is like an ice cube.

[00:04:04] You put in a glass of water.

[00:04:08] It cools the water, but it vanishes itself.

[00:04:10] The Rishis of India were the real leaders.

[00:04:14] That's why the biggest leaders of India are called Rajashis.

[00:04:18] Raja is the executive.

[00:04:19] Rishi is the reflecting entity.

[00:04:23] Raja is hard power.

[00:04:25] Rishi is soft power.

[00:04:26] When they come together,

[00:04:29] that model of leadership is what the world needs.

[00:04:32] It needs reflective action people.

[00:04:36] Behind every Alexander, there must be an Aristotle.

[00:04:41] Behind every Chandri Gupta, there has to be a Chanakya.

[00:04:44] Behind every Arjun, there has to be a Krishna.

[00:04:46] Without that, you can't have leadership.

[00:04:49] It's reflection plus action.

[00:04:51] That is Indian model.

[00:04:55] What is the one thing that you have learned,

[00:05:01] which you have imbibed in your life,

[00:05:04] that has been your productive driving force?

[00:05:10] Small work with great love.

[00:05:13] One sentence.

[00:05:15] I learned it from an unlikely person, Mother Teresa,

[00:05:19] who embraced Vivekananda.

[00:05:21] And I asked her,

[00:05:22] what does small work in great love?

[00:05:23] With great love, I couldn't get it.

[00:05:25] She was trying to explain to me.

[00:05:28] So I was out in the street.

[00:05:29] I wanted to meet her along with an American friend.

[00:05:32] And she was a Nobel laureate.

[00:05:34] Thousands of people working for her.

[00:05:37] And she got all of these ideas from the Vedantic tradition, by the way.

[00:05:40] She's Mother Teresa,

[00:05:42] the prime name in Christianity,

[00:05:44] but ethos is Indian.

[00:05:47] So I asked her,

[00:05:48] what does small work great love mean?

[00:05:50] She was trying to explain,

[00:05:51] but I couldn't get this.

[00:05:52] So I'm out in the street.

[00:05:54] I'd forgotten my bag

[00:05:55] in the place where she was talking to me

[00:05:57] and my friend.

[00:06:00] What she does is,

[00:06:01] she carries the bag in her hand

[00:06:02] and runs halfway across the street

[00:06:03] and Nobel laureate with a pacemaker in her heart

[00:06:05] just to return the bag to me.

[00:06:07] And I recognized that was small work.

[00:06:10] And that was great love.

[00:06:12] And then she explained again.

[00:06:14] She said,

[00:06:15] your work is local,

[00:06:16] but love is universal.

[00:06:20] It expands.

[00:06:21] Any work that you do,

[00:06:23] the love will expand the work.

[00:06:24] So if you put your,

[00:06:26] what does love mean in this context?

[00:06:28] If you put the entirety of your energy,

[00:06:31] your attention,

[00:06:34] in whatever you're doing,

[00:06:36] that work will expand.

[00:06:38] It will transcend national geographical boundaries.

[00:06:41] I put that into practice

[00:06:43] because I've seen a lot of people

[00:06:45] and they bring that intensity

[00:06:46] to whatever they do.

[00:06:48] That intensity is what

[00:06:51] takes them to huge spaces

[00:06:53] that they never imagined they would reach.

[00:06:55] How wonderful.

[00:06:56] But I do want to ask you one more.

[00:06:58] Yeah.

[00:06:58] If you could go back in history

[00:07:02] or if you were standing

[00:07:03] on the field of Mahabharata,

[00:07:05] who would you want to be

[00:07:06] and what would you want to ask?

[00:07:08] Who would I want to be?

[00:07:11] Depends on which part of life

[00:07:13] I want to be Arjun.

[00:07:16] I want to be Krishna.

[00:07:19] And for me,

[00:07:20] these two are not two different people.

[00:07:22] Like I said,

[00:07:22] one is Raja,

[00:07:23] the other is Rishi.

[00:07:24] One is the hardware,

[00:07:25] the other is software.

[00:07:26] I think one is incomplete

[00:07:28] without the other.

[00:07:29] So you want me to be Arjun,

[00:07:31] yes,

[00:07:31] when action is required,

[00:07:32] I want to be that.

[00:07:34] I want to be brave.

[00:07:35] I want to be courageous.

[00:07:36] I want to be emphatic.

[00:07:38] I want to be a sharpshooter.

[00:07:40] I want to be aggressive,

[00:07:41] necessarily.

[00:07:43] But I would

[00:07:45] also like to be playful,

[00:07:48] compassionate.

[00:07:50] I would like to be reflective.

[00:07:54] And that's where Krishna comes.

[00:07:56] So for me,

[00:07:58] these two sums up

[00:07:59] pretty much

[00:08:01] what I would choose

[00:08:02] from that battlefield.

[00:08:04] Okay.

[00:08:05] All right.

[00:08:07] Thank you.

[00:08:07] Thank you so very much.

[00:08:09] I got so impressed

[00:08:11] in this whole...

[00:08:12] Thanks for this great question,

[00:08:13] otherwise there's no conversation.

[00:08:16] No, no.

[00:08:17] Thank you so very much,

[00:08:18] Professor Devashish.

[00:08:19] Chachiji.

[00:08:20] The link to the full episode,

[00:08:22] Is It India's Century and Why?

[00:08:24] is available below.

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[00:08:39] India,

[00:08:39] a story in the making.