Entrepreneurship and "Making Money"

"Making Money" is still a taboo in many communities (I am NOT referring to any religious communities) in India. One's upbringing is never to "Make Money", but to earn knowledge and spread knowledge. Money is viewed as evil and earned only how much is needed to live a simple possible life.

We need to change the view of "Making Money" into "Creating Wealth" or "Creating Value". This is very key to the development of Entrepreneurship in India. This is hard; especially if you have to do this within moral, ethical and legal framework.

We want to see entrepreneurship in many sectors - energy, education and exposure are fundamental. In addition to these, Healthcare and Technology are the two sectors which need to evolve around these core sectors. It will be hard see traditional investors and entrepreneurs in core sectors; however, I think there is significant profits to be made in core sectors.

How could we make money or create wealth or create value in these sectors? How can we stimulate growth in entrepreneurship in India?

New kind of intellect

Shri Krishna Shastry (Balila school fame) and Shri S.L. Bhairappa (well known novelist) are the different kind of intellectuals I saw in my life till today. I met Krishna Shastry through one of my close friends, Jags, in a school where he studied. This short writing is not sufficient to write about both of these scholars; I will just make some mentions of my recent experiences.

I recently met Krishna Shastry again in one of the social gatherings. As usual, I was thrilled to meet him. Conversation turned towards western culture. I opined to him that USA has a great culture of honesty, integrity & professionalism and social and family values very similar to India. I also mentioned to him that USA is ahead of any other country today in every field because they work harder and have high level of work culture. He asked me why should then Indians say that western culture is bad! Media problems! Perception problems!?

I have been telling this to many of my country men I met during the past several years. But none resonates like Shri Shastry. We continued our great conversation and concluded that if such is the culture of western states, we must welcome it!

I have seen S.L. Bhairappa only through his works. Let us talk about him in the next blog. He is kind of "right to the center" as per me. Anyways, he is one of the courageous one!

3 E's that we need

Energy, Education and Exposure are what we fundamentally need to achieve next level in our villages. I am convinced if we work these three, other things will fall in place.

Energy: One of the main resources which is at scarce. There are abundant unconventional ways through which we would be able to substitute traditional energy. I very well remember we used gas from animal waste to light our houses and cook in the village where I used to live. It is a normal practice in India to use solar energy to heat water. We need to now see how we can use these unconventional sources to run water pumps, to switch on stoves, to run TV’s & computers, and provide heat in the winter.

Education: There are thousands of lectures going on every hour in many parts of the world. Technology can help in recording these and re-broadcasting in every village in India. We could be using internet, mobile phones, TV’s or radios. With kind of realization that we have about education, every village will accept this gladly. People would be willing to pay fee to learn in a structured way which will in turn help to build a career.

Exposure: There are gazillion things which need to be told to the world about India. World has just scratched the surface with the discovery of talented software engineers. We have scholars in every field. We need exposure through internet, broadcasting and what not.

I want to see social entrepreneurs focusing on these areas. Microfinancing has got its popularity and growing. Our next challenges will be energy, education and exposure.