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SN Subrahmanyan, a prominent Indian businessman, made comments earlier this month calling for a 90-hour work week. In doing so, he sparked a furor by touching on the twin obsessions of the country’s professional class: long work hours and their toll on family life.
“To be honest, I regret that I cannot force you to work on Sundays,” the chairman of conglomerate Larsen & Toubro told staff at a corporate event in Mumbai.
“If I could make you work on Sundays, I would be happier because I also work on Sundays.”
“What are you doing sitting at home?” he added. “How long can you look at your wife, how long can the wife look at her husband? Come on, go to the office and start working.”
Although the meeting was to take place within the company walls, a video was posted on Reddit and then widely shared online, to widespread outrage and bewilderment among Indians.
This is not the first time that a business Leader has reprimanded employees in India for the hours they work.
NR Narayana Murthy, chairman of outsourcing giant Infosys, sparked similar controversy last year after asking India’s young people to work 70 hours a week to compete with companies like China, and urging them to avoid acquiring “habits.” not so desirable in the industry.” West”.
In 2011, the late Ratan Tata, chairman of the Tata Group, questioned the work ethic of British management following his group’s acquisitions of Jaguar Land Rover and Corus, stating that “no one is willing to go the extra mile.”
In a country with a conservative government that values consensus and bristles at criticism, Indian corporate bosses tend to maintain public statements formal and patriotic, if not studiously bland.
Subrahmanyan’s comments have attracted attention for his blunt candor and his reference to staring at one’s wife, which some Indians found strange and which helped the video go viral.
“He said it seemed like being at home and being with your spouse was a terrible waste of time,” said Rituparna Chakraborty, co-founder of Teamlease, an Indian staffing company.
Some uxurious Indian men have in recent days posted photographs of themselves gazing lovingly at their wives; others renamed Sunday “Stareday,” which is now circulating online as a hashtag.
Top Indian chief executives have joined in; some perhaps sensed an opportunity to signal virtues or schadenfreude.
“My wife is wonderful,” Anand Mahindra, chief executive of the family conglomerate of the same name, said at a conference this week in New Delhi. “I love looking at her.”
Mahindra added that the debate that had broken out was going “in the wrong direction” and should be about the quality of work, not the quantity.
Larsen & Toubro has steered clear of the controversy, initially backing its president in a statement that said “extraordinary results require extraordinary effort.” Colleagues say he wasn’t serious. Subrahmanyan has declined to comment.
The question of how many hours executives should work in India has given rise to serious debates about the country’s economic growth.
Far from online jokes and memes, Subrahmanyan’s comments struck a chord because India’s professional workers are feeling the effects of persistent inflation and wage stagnation. This, in turn, fuels oft-expressed fears that India – no matter how hard or how long people work – is heading towards a “middle-income trap”, in which its huge population ages before the economy gets richer.
While there is no reliable data available on average working hours in India, long commutes of two to three hours each way are common in Indian cities.
Rajiv Bajaj, CEO of Bajaj Auto, said Indian companies should move away from “archaic and regressive policies” of enforcing long working hours and instead focus on “speed at the forefront.”
Others were more direct. “90 hours a week?” Harsh Goenka, president of RPG Group, fumed in a post on X. “Why not rename Sunday ‘Sun-duty’ and make ‘day off’ a mythical concept?”