This is a re-post written during the year 2009 from my old blog site
The celebrations occurred on August 29th and 30th, 2009. This page is about Aug 29th panel discussion that took place in Taj West End, Bangalore. I haven’t seen any organization which has such a bonding that it decided to get together everyone after 25 years with former and present employees self-sponsoring the event. It was touching. Other than the great Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam, I also shook hands with the other great, Sam Pitroda and got autographs from both of them :). I feel like a kid who met SuperMan & SpiderMan together.
The panel discussion was focused on What Next? The theme was how to make a positive impact on the bottom of the pyramid i.e. lower strata of the country.
There was an entrepreneur who does micro-financing to rural India folks, a young Politian from Andhra who has taken some good e-governance measures, there was a member from IIMB faculty and Sam who participated in the panel discussion. The focus for Sam was broadband connectivity, for the politician, it was challenges in bringing in transparency and accountability among bureaucrats and politicians, for the IIM-B prof, it was rural education and the entrepreneur talked about the need for providing them immediate financial assistance.
The jist of keynote speech from APJ and other speeches from Sam and Sri Sri Sri Ravishankar is below
APJ Abdul Kalam
“Vision drives a nation. Without a clear vision, a nation is akin to a balloon without air. Vision needs passion and passion will transform vision into action.”
Sam Pitroda
“After connectivity, the next challenge is to benefit from the information and communication technology (ICT) revolution to improve education, health, agriculture, financial services and e-governance, and bring growth to the doorsteps of those at the bottom of the social pyramid,” Towards this end, India Think Tank, a non-profit initiative by alumni of the C-DOT, has been set up.
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
“Leadership and love go hand-in-hand. Only a leader who loves his people naturally, selflessly and unconditionally will reap success.“