Globalization has transformed Bangalore into the fastest growing city in India after New Delhi. Between 1991 and 2001, the city's population experienced 38% growth. In 2005, Bangalore's population was estimated at just over six million people and is one of India's major economic hubs.

In the mid 1990s, Bangalore became host to dozens of multinational Information Technology (IT), which have been lured by the city's highly educated and relatively cheap labor force. Nearly 1,500 IT companies have set up business in Bangalore in the last two decades churning out 38% of India's $22 billion IT and software exports. This has given Bangalore status as India's high-tech capital, often nicknamed the Silicon Valley of India after Silicon Valley, California where the software boom of the 1990s began.

Rise in Income Changes Priorities for Young Bangaloreans

A significant portion of these multinational IT companies are business process outsourcing companies (BPOs) or call centers and have set up their operations in Bangalore to take advantage of its large body of English speaking university graduates. Bangalore has a literacy rate of about 86% and is home to about 25,000 of India's 220,000 computer engineers. The city also has top science and technology institutes such as the Indian Institute of Information Technology and the Indian Institute of Science, ranked one of the top 20 universities in the world.

A large portion of these engineers are young graduates in their 20s and 30s, just beginning their careers. The salaries they can earn by working at a call center often enable them to become financially independent. Twenty years ago before the software boom arrived in Bangalore, it was not easy for young people to earn such high wages. Traditionally and in part for financial reasons, Indian children were expected to live at home until marriage. Today, however, the situation is changing in places like Bangalore where young adults are offered new opportunities to earn a living from IT companies, which were not available to their parents a generation ago. Even though entry-level workers in the IT sector earn about $6,000 a year, this is still significantly more than their parents could have ever earned at that age.

In part for financial reasons, Indian children were traditionally expected to live at home until marriage. Today, however, the situation is changing in places like Bangalore where young adults are offered new opportunities to earn a living from IT companies.

Affluent, young Bangaloreans are taking advantage of their newfound wealth by moving away from their families to live on their own. Women especially are putting off starting a family to focus on their careers. Nearly half of new recruits for many IT companies are women. This has also meant a rise in the number of love marriages as opposed to marriages arranged by families and less emphasis on staying a virgin before marriage. According to India Today magazine, 25% of women ages 18 to 30 in Bangalore have sex before they are married. These trends began slowly in the 1970s and 1980s and accelerated with India's rise in wealth attributed to the software boom in the 1990s. This frequently results in a clash between older and younger generations. Parents feel they have less ability to influence their children's decisions while their children feel their parents' traditional expectations are unreasonable.

Company Training That Teaches Employees to Speak American

Over the years, multinational firms based in Europe and the United States have developed a homogenized business culture rooted in western practice. Daily interaction between Bangaloreans and people in offices in cities around the world like London, Mumbai, Tokyo and New York is dominated by Anglo-American culture. As a result many Indian employees are expected by their employers to act and talk more like Westerners. Many receive training from their employers who hire consultants from the US, Canada or England to provide courses in English or American accents, culture, the latest sports, cinema or news events. Employees practice American or English colloquialisms and are taught to make references to the weather or the latest episodes of English or American television sitcoms or movies.

Keeping American and European Working Hours Takes Its Toll On New Recruits

Working hours in Bangalore have also shifted to accommodate business hours abroad, mainly in the US and Europe. There are, for example, about one hundred thousand Indians employed in back office services, which include call centers, human resources, accounting and payroll management. Many are expected to keep the same working hours with their American or European client bases even though there is five hours difference between Bangalore and the UK and nine and half hours between Bangalore and New York. Employees often must sleep during the day and work through the night, sacrificing their social and family life and sometimes even their health.

Some young people are happy to accept the remuneration in exchange for the burden of an odd work schedule. However, many have difficulty coping. Companies are recognizing that this has adversely impacted some employees' ability to concentrate, resulting in poorer service and a higher rate of employee turnover. Dell, for example, closed down one of its call centers in India as a result of customer complaints of poor service and language difficulties.

New Lifestyle Encourages Young Bangaloreans To Spend More

Western companies - keenly aware of the growth in wealth and change in lifestyle among Bangalore's noveau riche - have designed clever marketing campaigns to woo customers. The infiltration of western luxury goods has created a cultural shift toward materialism and consumerism. Realizing that more young people are living on their own, companies present their goods as outlets of individual expression. American and European brands market clothes, accessories, cars, perfume and even furniture as status symbols to show off one's own personal style. Magazine covers, television and cinema feature beautiful Indian movie stars sporting the latest Yves St. Laurent fashion or Coach handbag.

Enjoying one's financial independence has come to mean spending loads of money on western products. Bangalore's increasing number of shopping centers and malls are comparable to any in the United States or Europe and capable of catering to the increasing demands of Bangalore's shoppers.

Enjoying one's financial independence has come to mean spending loads of money on western products. Bangalore's increasing number of shopping centers and malls are comparable to any in the United States or Europe and capable of catering to the increasing demands of Bangalore's shoppers. Fully air-conditioned department stores that are brightly lit with shiny marble floors and endless aisles of well-stocked, neatly stacked inventory resemble any Macy's or H&M in New York or London. Fast food restaurants, smoothie bars and coffee shops line the food courts while stylishly dressed young Indian men and women, garbed in a mix of designer western brand names and traditional Indian clothes, wander in and out of stores with shopping bags, while chatting on the newest style cell phone.

Bangalore's Poor

Globalization in Bangalore has introduced economic growth and opportunities to young people to become financially independent from their families with a disposable income to indulge in a higher standard of living. Unfortunately, this prosperity is not evenly shared throughout Bangalore's society. Bangalore has 800 slums and over 2 million people living in abject poverty. Though some of the poor have benefited from an increase in demand for construction labor and domestic services, the wages they receive are insufficient to afford the rising cost of living in Bangalore. According to a report, the current minimum wage is not enough to sustain a basic standard of living. The report calculated what an average family would need to spend in order to meet basic requirements on a monthly basis. It found that a typical family consisting of three wage earners supporting six family members earns an average monthly income that falls short by 21% of what is needed to live. Even if a minimum wage earner works 8 hours a day with no days off or sick pay, she will still only be able to bring a third of the total amount an average family needs.

Employees of multinational companies in Bangalore receive health benefits and many companies even provide their employees with housing and transportation. Very few of the poor receive any such benefits from the government, which has been severely criticized for being overly bureaucratic, corrupt and slow to respond to the dire needs of Bangalore's most destitute. Private companies circumvent Bangalore's infrastructure problems including poor roads, inadequate waste management systems, water shortages and electricity outages by constructing their own parallel systems exclusively for their employees, leaving the poor to cope in the city's over-crowded slums.

Is Globalization A Blessing or Curse?

Globalization tends to have its winners and losers, its advantages and drawbacks. In Bangalore, globalization has greatly expanded professional opportunities for educated women, which has enabled them to gain financial independence earlier in life. As a result many women feel less pressure to take on family commitments before they are ready. On the other hand, globalization has not done much to relieve Bangalore's impoverished. The full benefit of increased economic growth, which globalization has brought to Bangalore, has yet to be felt throughout Bangalore. This can only happen if those who have reaped globalization's rewards - IT firms and their employees - make a concerted effort to use the rise in wealth to improve the living conditions of the poor.

Unfortunately, this prosperity is not evenly shared throughout Bangalore's society. Bangalore has 800 slums and over 2 million people living in abject poverty.

Young Bangaloreans can enjoy their newfound wealth and at the same time do something to address the city's horrible poverty. They can do more than over-indulge and succumb to American and European designer brands' clever marketing campaigns. On a recent visit to Bangalore, I spoke with a man in his early 30s who works for a computer software company about the plight of the city's poor. He said that he felt the problem was worsening and that the government was not doing much about it.

India is still a developing country and faces significant poverty, disease and shortages in housing, water and energy. The country as a whole could benefit more from its young people becoming more involved in community development projects that assist the poor. They could lobby their government to raise minimum wage, invest in housing and health services, and help secure enough water and food for the poor. Companies could also initiate community development projects or offer employees opportunities to donate their service or a part of their income to charity.

India has a centuries long tradition of caring for the poor. All three of its major religions, Hinduism, Islam and Christianity have doctrines that teach the faithful to show kindness and provide to those less fortunate. Globalization might have challenged some of India's traditions, but that does not mean all should be tossed aside and forgotten. Remembering its spiritual heritage may be the way for Bangalore and India to make the most of globalization for everyone.




Contributed by Cory McCruden, a Rotary World Peace Fellow and writer for Global Envision.

To read another Global Envision article about economic development in India, see India - No Longer A Diamond in the Rough.



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