Category: Excerpts

Larsen & Toubro Infotech Limited (“L&T Infotech”), one of India’s global Information Technology (“IT”) services & solutions companies and a subsidiary of Larsen & Toubro Limited (“L&T”), today announced its entry in the ‘PEAK Matrix Service Provider of the Year™: ITS Top 20’ by the Everest Group.

In 2015, Everest Group published 26 PEAK Matrix^TM IT services evaluations featuring 59 service providers across various parameters related to scale and scope of operations, technology, domain investments, delivery footprint, innovation, buyer satisfaction and resultant market success in the context of a given outsourcing function. Of these service providers, the Top 20 were shortlisted using a consolidated score reflecting points received on individual evaluations based on tiered scores for Star Performer, Leader, Major Contender, and Aspirant positions.

Further, the assessments also offer insights into the strategies pursued by service providers for key business lines, geographies and technologies.

“The global services industry is witnessing significant disruption due to rapid evolution in technology and sourcing models. The PEAK Matrix IT Service Provider of the Year™ ranking for L&T Infotech is indicative of a service provider’s broad-based capabilities and services strategies to help enterprises successfully navigate the disruption in global services,” said Jimit Arora, Partner, Everest Group.

Speaking on the achievement, Mr. Sanjay Jalona, Chief Executive Officer & Managing Director, L&T Infotech, said, “This recognition reflects our top-class talent, which has further enhanced our deep domain knowledge and emerging technology strength for all our customers. It is this breadth and depth of capabilities that enables us to solve complex business challenges at the convergence of the digital and physical world. We aim to further strengthen these capabilities for our clients.”-from BusinessWire

(Anybody interested in buying/selling shares of L&T Infotech,kindly email me at Alpha Ideas)

HDFC Bank “has got no love and respect for India” as it put the country’s reputation at stake by not activating a debit card of a couple “trapped in a foreign country”, the apex consumer court has said.

The National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) made the observations while asking the bank to pay a compensation of Rs 5 lakh to the Indian couple, who were stuck in Thailand and Singapore as the bank did not activate their debit card for 10 days in 2008.

“The bank has got no love and respect for India. The reputation of India was at stake. Knowing fully well that Indians were trapped in a foreign country, it was the bounden duty of the manager to swing into action immediately. He committed an egregious mistake for taking no action for 10 days. It exposes the sloth and callousness on the part of the manager. This shows negligence, inaction and passivity on the part of the bank.”

“Foreigners always complain that due to procedural delays, they do not want to have business relations with this country. The lackadaisical approach by the bank is surprising. The bank manager did not make any effort to straighten out the problem,” the Bench headed by Justice J M Malik said.-from BS

A small, modest, ground-floor flat in Juhu was his home and, on the first floor, a tiny cubbyhole served as his workplace. It was in the cubbyhole that we used to meet.

There were no chairs, only mattresses with cushions in the makeshift study. One sat next to him on the floor. He had no writing table, just a raised wooden platform with numerous nib-pens and inkwells, both red and blue. (He used red ink for exclamation marks, something he had a weakness for.) And, of course, the cubicle was full of clippings, periodicals, books and postcards. On the walls were displayed signed photographs of himself with Khrushchev, Tito, Nasser, Nehru. Despite the clutter it was not an untidy room. A chaiwala brought oversweet tea in glass tumblers at regular intervals—that was the extent of his hospitality. To say he lived frugally would be superfluous; he was a communist, even if linked to the glamorous film industry.

From this cubicle he wrote, directed and produced fourteen flop films. And scripted Raj Kapoor’s iconic Awara, Boot Polish, Shri 420, Jagte Raho, Bobby, Mera Naam Joker and many others. He also published sixty books, fiction and non-fiction. He was a busy communist.

Forever in debt and forever scrounging around for money, he borrowed from friends and moneylenders. All the films under his banner, Naya Sansar, were not minor box-office disasters but gigantic box-office disasters. ‘Some people say I am mulish, trying out themes of social realism without compromise,’ he explained. ‘“Give the people what they want,” they advise. But I believe in doing what satisfies not only my personal ego but also my social conscience.’

Abbas’s films would start promisingly. Sadly, after the first half, he would slump into sermonizing, making his cinema didactic and tedious. Fully conscious of the hazards of mixing propaganda and entertainment, he persisted. ‘All the money I make from Raj Kapoor, I put into my flops,’ he joked. He admitted history would remember him only as the producer who introduced Amitabh Bachchan to Bollywood (Saat Hindustani), a fact Amitabh himself acknowledged, saying if Abbas had not given him a break, he would have gone back to his boxwala executive job in Calcutta.

He worshipped Jawaharlal Nehru and lovingly recalled all his meetings with Panditji, especially the last one at Teen Murti, a week before Nehru passed away. As Abbas walked up to greet him, Nehru, weak after his stroke, tried to get up from his chair. Abbas urged him not to bother. ‘Abbas, I may be about to die but I haven’t forgotten my tehzeeb (culture).’ When he recounted this story his eyes welled up.

I remember him for his loyalty to a wonderful romantic vision, and also the lunches he bought me. On the first of the month he would collect his monthly salary of Rs 500 from the Blitz office and treat me at the Jehangir Art Gallery restaurant, Samovar. ‘You can have beer if you like,’ he would say. ‘Today I have money, tomorrow I won’t.’–wrote Vinod Mehta

If the due process of law was followed  in time then Vijay Mallya would have been history by now !….the irony is that the victims,the KFA Employees ( a captain on a panel voiced this) want him free so he’s able to pay them their dues….for if he goes behind bars so goes their hopes!….

a stock market scamster comes to mind who was arrested & convicted as he owed the  banks heavily but has been on bail  on an Apex Court Appeal now pending for years and has been able to repay the Banks despite his accounts being frozen ! ~ tacit!? …think about it !….manipulated & rigged stocks & got into trouble….then manipulated & rigged stocks again to repay !….the World is round indeed !

–wrote Gaurav

Hmm…maybe NSEL victims should plead for Jignesh Shah’s release !