[Thad E Ginathom]

It is a leap into a side issue, but I'd say that the right to representation and the right to represent oneself are both fundamental.

How good or bad the system, or the individuals in it are, really has nothing to do with that principle. deep-bang, I find your comment fairly meaningless, especially as it is nothing to do with lawyers or their lack that those with money and influence walk free, possibly never even getting as far as a court.

This is a whole side issue. I don't think we should let it distract us from following and discussing the news as it happens.

[prasadee]

Originally Posted by diabloo

Looks like Govt will bail out Satyam - Govt plans Rs 2000-crore financial aid for Satyam

If US Govt can bail out its auto industry, then why not India its IT?
Or does it set a bad precedent?

I hope our tax money does not go down the drain. Our govt. seems to learn all the bad lessons from the US really fast. Let Satyam go bust, and there are tens of other services companies that can acquite their assets and customers. The entire IT industry is very "portable" unlike an auto industry with lots of fixed assets and vendor network/ecosystem.
-Prasadee

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by diabloo

If US Govt can bail out its auto industry, then why not India its IT?
Or does it set a bad precedent?

Satyam is not the entire IT industry. Satyam case is very similar to Enron, and US government didn't bailout Enron or even Arthur Andersen.

Therefore, government paying our tax money to save Satyam is really really stupid, and unfair to rest of the IT industry who are not into scamming the investors.

[sgiitk]

I would like to take the middle path. Providing financing for a month or two's running costs (essentially wages) is not bad. I have a strong feeling the cash flow should be adequate to keep Satyam going, and once the accounting mess is figured out (sorting out will take much longer) they should be able to pay back over a year or two. If their CFO claims (could be true for all you know) that he was managing with the cash flow alone for quite some time then this should still be true, esp. with no fellow with his hand in the till.

[amitoj]

Originally Posted by diabloo

Looks like Govt will bail out Satyam - Govt plans Rs 2000-crore financial aid for Satyam

If US Govt can bail out its auto industry, then why not India its IT?
Or does it set a bad precedent?

I hope its one of those tons of plans from the government that never take off and stay on paper only.

Btw, that article has horrible English. Most appalling i have ever read on a news website.

[Sudipto-S-Team]

Are you guys aware that prime minister's relief fund had commissioined Maytas to build a township in Jammu for Rs 260 crore for Kashmiri pundits and that Sonia Gandhi had visited this project site in April 2008? This news is on the Maytas website under the press release section. Anyone can please check the site.
No wonder the Congress-led central government is very sympathetic to Satyam and is ready to bail it out with Rs 2000 crore.

[ECM]

Very well said Samu,I agree with your points of view.

Satyam is not the entire IT industry. Satyam case is very similar to Enron, and US government didn't bailout Enron or even Arthur Andersen.

Therefore, government paying our tax money to save Satyam is really really stupid, and unfair to rest of the IT industry who are not into scamming the investors.

[HappyWheels]

Now, check this out:

Satyam scam: Govt bailout may fly into web of lies- Software-Infotech-The Economic Times

Quote - " ...A stock-taking exercise at the highest level of government has ascertained that Satyam immediately requires Rs 1,000 crore to pay rents in the US and salaries. However, the government is unlikely to provide any funds because of a report from the Registrar of Companies that the documents accessed from the company are a pack of lies. Satyam’s beleaguered statutory auditor Price Waterhouse has also told the government that it had physically verified with the banks concerned fixed deposit receipts worth Rs 3,300 crore.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who took stock of the situation with his senior colleagues Pranab Mukherjee, P Chidambaram, Kamal Nath, Premchand Gupta and Montek Singh Ahluwalia, was of the view that the government can discuss a rescue plan for the company only after assessing the nature of the company’s troubles. “Every document is forged and the government cannot make an assessment now,” said a minister who attended the meeting.
...
Given this backdrop, the government can’t blindly underwrite a bailout package. “The government just cannot write out a cheque. In this situation, no bank will be willing to lend money to the company,” said the minister.
..." - Unquote.

Talk about a black hole, this one takes the light!

[garyjacob]

Exclusive::Satyam employee pours it out in an Email

Its written by a Satyam employee:

At a time when almost 90% of my Satyam friends are cribbing about the fraud and betrayal by Ramalinga Raju, I have a slightly different opinion. It's bold of me to write this in black and white but this comes straight from my heart and experience.

Let me start by quoting an example of 2006. Most of my friends were unemployed with 50-60% plus marks in BTech, with a degree from an average University and hunting madly for a job. Whether people accept it today or not but the truth remains that Satyam was the ONLY saviour and the only mass recruiter who was ready to accept students who had back logs but had cleared them and also it did not put a very strict minimum marks criterion. And this was true not only for my small college at Lucknow but also those across India . Satyam is the fourth largest in IT in India. Looking at India's population I really want to thank Raju for giving some 54000 Indians jobs atleast for all these years . He was the reason for the revival of confidence and the reason for the bread and butter for many a families.

Satyam training was renowned all over India. Their STC training centre created numerous love stories and unexpected rekindling of a youthful environment where girls and boys were more indepenent than their college days . I remember most of my Satyam friends felt that they made better friends at Satyam's three to six months training than those in the four years of BTech.

Unfortunately people forget to thank God in sad times . I understand that what Raju did is deplorable and unpardonable. He should have treated business more formally and not dealt with it like a family affair . He should have been strict a couple of months or years before itself. Why did he hire so many non potential candidates and keep them on bench? When were the managers and the team mates last told that if they dont work hard, they will lose their job? Business cannot be run lousily.

I have been staying with some 200 odd girls for the last 2 years and many of them are from Satyam. Moreover I network a lot and I have lots of male friends at Satyam . I have seen how people tail gate to Satyam, how they give their swipe cards to others to swipe it on their behalf , how female employees have gone home sharp at 6am irrespective of when they landed at office, how employees sit at home for months at a stretch, prepare for all kind of post graduate entrance exams and still enjoy a full month's pay, how often they went for movies at local theatres at office hours, how often employees went to office just to sign on registers in the morning and at evening, how often they faked their certificates , how often they put unlimited fake medical and house rental bills.

How can we blame just one man when EACH AND EVERY person was disloyal ? How can we exclude Auditors like PwC ? How can we exclude the Board of Directors who have washed their hands off so clean? How can we exclude banks who gave hefty loans without true verfication? How can we exclude the Chief Minister of AP who allowed leniency for Raju's fellow businessman? How can we exclude managers who were never able to trace which bench employee under him had been away from office for how long ?

Yet how can people forget this is the same man whose ideas and potentials gave them an identity for the past several years? How many couples found the right match at an IT industry , courtesy Satyam and how many Andhra farmers benefited from their crores of investments in Satyam shares .How can people forget that Satyam launched its offices right at the doorsteps of a residential colony, where people can simply walk to work ?

The most gruesome experience that I can recollect was when a Satyam tag wearing person was waiting to attend an interview and I overheard him saying that he was in a business meeting at the My Home Satyam ( Madhapur) office when he was sitting right infront of me at a totally different company. When employees themselves show such a lousy attitude and dont care a damn for the brand that they carry around their neck, how can they expect others to care?

I am not saying that ALL Satyam employees are bad. I have known very dedicated people too, but my point is very clear, before pointing fingers at others, introspect .There are thousands of people who have completed certifications at the cost of Satyam, got trained at Satyam. Satyam made several freshers stand on their feet to get better jobs elsewhere across the globe and attain onsite exposure through Satyam.

What Raju did was to keep the business of Satyam going at any cost. I see a very smart man in him when he understood that he should rather accept his mistake than be caught by the USA laws . I see a selfish father in him too that he put a lot at stake for Maytas. However, he resigned with a lot of dignity and his letter of resignation shows humility. It takes a mammoth amount of courage to accept your mistake in public at a time when the media is ready to blow everything out of proportion. If humans dont make mistakes who else would ?

My last salute to this man is for creating such mass employment in India for 57k employees and 57k families when even opening a beetle(pan) shop in a lane in India is a challenge !! Thanks to him for creating income for all the thousands of families who benefited through food chains, the tiffin wallahs, the transport people and all those who made money by renting their houses.

I read he donated Rs 12000 crores from his personal pocket to give the January salary of his Satyam employees. Today Satyamites call Raju a FRAUD. The true and loyal Satyamites surely have all the reasons to say this word. But all the rest who sucked every rupee out of Satyam without doing any value addition need to understand - who was a bigger fraud.


Komal Rastogi

[Sudipto-S-Team]

I am surprised how the Planning Commission and Montek Singh Ahluwalia got involved in this bail out package discussion. This same Planning Commission had rebuked the upright Delhi Metro CEO E. Sreedharan when he publicly called the bluff of the Raju family in November over the Hyderabad metro project.

[diabloo]

Satyam isn't a social-welfare organization - it was a profit-making entity. Company will perform only those activities which generate profits and sometimes goodwill.

All I can say is Satyam had pretty bad work culture. Blame Satyam managers?

Originally Posted by garyjacob

I have seen how people tail gate to Satyam, how they give their swipe cards to others to swipe it on their behalf , how female employees have gone home sharp at 6am irrespective of when they landed at office, how employees sit at home for months at a stretch, prepare for all kind of post graduate entrance exams and still enjoy a full month's pay, how often they went for movies at local theatres at office hours, how often employees went to office just to sign on registers in the morning and at evening, how often they faked their certificates , how often they put unlimited fake medical and house rental bills.

Metro man E Sreedharan suggested that a "big political scandal" was brewing in the Hyderabad Metro project in September last year, the Andhra Pradesh government threatened him with defamation.

But, with Satyam chairman Ramalinga Raju confessing to defrauding his own company of over Rs 7,000 crore and accepting the charge that the aborted buyout of Maytas was also part of this fraud, Sreedharan's apprehensions appear to be justified.

The Hyderabad Metro project is being developed by Maytas Infra, a company promoted by Teja Raju, son of Ramalinga Raju, and other members of the Raju family.

Metro Sreedharan was the whistleblower?

Sreedharan dubbed the Hyderabad Metro a real estate play, a sale of family silver and a political scandal waiting to happen.

The Hyderabad Metro model has support from the Planning Commission. It was Gajendra Haldea, principal adviser to the panel’s deputy chairman, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, who drafted the concession agreement and also the procedure to short-list bidders on the basis of their financial and technical qualifications

The Planning Commission appreciated the process and termed the project a model for the entire country.

Originally Posted by Sudipto-S-Team

I am surprised how the Planning Commission and Montek Singh Ahluwalia got involved in this bail out package discussion. This same Planning Commission had rebuked the upright Delhi Metro CEO E. Sreedharan when he publicly called the bluff of the Raju family in November over the Hyderabad metro project.

[akroy]

Originally Posted by diabloo

All I can say is Satyam had pretty bad work culture. Blame Satyam managers?

Oh is it? Which Circle/SubCircle in Satyam do you work for?

Out of the 3 companies I worked for, I found Satyam work culture the best atleast in my circle for sure.

Abhi

[diabloo]

Based on the email circulated by a well-networked Satyam employee, who had seen how her colleagues were cheating the company.

So you had a good experience. That means the work culture is not consistent across locations.

Originally Posted by akroy

Oh is it? Which Circle/SubCircle in Satyam do you work for?

Out of the 3 companies I worked for, I found Satyam work culture the best atleast in my circle for sure.

Abhi

[greenhorn]

Let me start by quoting an example of 2006...Whether people accept it today or not but the truth remains that Satyam was the ONLY saviour and the only mass recruiter who was ready to accept students who had back logs but had cleared them and also it did not put a very strict minimum marks criterion.

ahem! not to nitpick, I'm a 2006 batch guy too, and if the above were true, yours truly would still have been jobless. I had 5 pending backlogs when i was recruited by a top 3 indian MNC in a mega recruitment drive

[mail4loys]

Originally Posted by akroy

Oh is it? Which Circle/SubCircle in Satyam do you work for?

Out of the 3 companies I worked for, I found Satyam work culture the best atleast in my circle for sure.

Abhi

@akroy: out of 6 companies that i worked for, i found Satyam work culture to be the worst!