Could this portend a shift in India's industrial evolution?.... _
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A Touch of 'Indian-ness' Amid the Glass and Steel
By SARITHA RAI
BANGALORE, India, Aug. 21 -
Drivingfrom the airport into this city thathas become India's technology
hub,visitors are struck by the gleam ofsteel-and-glass high-rise office
andapartment buildings with names likeGolden Enclave and Diamond
District.Farther along, dozens of box-shaped,glass-encased buildings
carrysignboards of the biggest Westernhigh-tech companies.In contrast to
these unabashed clonesof buildings in Palo Alto or San Jose isa 37-acre
campus in the heart of thecity whose granite- and terracotta-adorned
buildings are setamong decades-old trees and paintedin vibrant Indian
shades of brick redand deep green. The buildings havenames from the ancient
Indianlanguage of Sanskrit, while the roomswithin are named after the
ancientbooks of learning, the Vedas. Everymorning the Indian flag
isceremonially hoisted on a centralflagpole, an unusual practice
forbusinesses here. At lunchtime, thechirping of birds mixes with
thechatter of workers in the open spaces. Young men in jeans and polo
shirtsand women in colorful salwar kameez(an Indian tunic and trouser
suit)linger along the stone-pavedavenues.The campus, with its
distinctivearchitecture, is the headquarters ofa four-year-old
outsourcingcompany called ITC Infotech. With4,000 employees and $55 million
inrevenues, the company's professedphilosophy is not to let its workplacebe
an imitation of countless modernbuildings. Flouting the local fashionfor
buildings with names like Hi-TechTower or Software Techcity, thecompany
calls its campus simply theITC Infotech Park. As its managingdirector,
Sanjay Verma said, "Thiscampus reflects our Indian-ness."The tranquil
expanse that blends theold and the new provides relief amidthe concrete and
glass structures inBangalore, a city that the World Banklists as among the
fastest growing inthe world. The country's biggestdomestic outsourcing
companies likeInfosys Technologies and Wipro areheadquartered here, as are
theIndian branches of multinationals likeIntel and Texas Instruments.In the
last decade, the boom in theoutsourcing of services fromWestern countries
has brought abouta construction explosion in the oncequiet and orderly
Bangalore. Callcenter and software servicescompanies have grabbed
whateverhigh-rise buildings that havesprouted up, as if overnight,
withscant regard to urban planning ordesign."Companies say, 'We need a
millionsquare feet of space,' then go totheir laptops and slap aluminum
andglass over the million square feet,"said Bob Hoekstra, head of
thesoftware division at Philips ElectronicsIndia.Mr. Hoekstra, who is
campaigning forthe local government to improvefacilities like roads,
traffic systemsand public transport, saidmultinationals like Intel and SAP
AGhad given little thought to aesthetics."Intel's campus looks like a
parking lotwith a building in the middle; SAP'sresembles the Frankfurt
airport," hesaid.In the new buildings of Bangalore, andother outsourcing
centers likenearby Chennai or Gurgaon in thesuburbs of New Delhi, academics
seean eagerness to conform to what isperceived here as the Western
taste."Companies psychologically feel thattheir Western clients want to
comehere and see something that looksfamiliar and efficient," said
AparnaNarasimhan, an architect at theBangalore-based firmVenkataramanan
Associates, whichhas designed buildings for Infosys andGeneral
Electric.When ITC Infotech set out threeyears ago to plan its campus,
itbucked such trends. Opportunely, itsparent, ITC Ltd., a
100-year-oldcigarette maker with interests inhotels, apparel and food
products,offered its defunct tobaccomanufacturing complex in
centralBangalore. But one architect afteranother suggested the same
plan:bulldoze the 36 tobacco warehousesand replace them withglass-and-steel
high-rises. Mr.Verma, ITC Infotech's top executive,who first joined the
parent companyas a young shift engineer at thistobacco complex in 1981,
found thisidea repugnant. Finally, the companycame to the
Bangalore-basedarchitect Krishnarao Jaisim, whoagreed with Mr. Verma that
the oldstructures and environment wereworth preserving.Mr. Jaisim, whose
firm is namedJaisim Fountainhead, in reference tothe Ayn Rand novel, said
his work hadalways been defined by the book'scentral character, the
architectHoward Roark."I read the book in the 1960's; it hasbeen my moral
guideline ever since,"he said. The book influenced him towork on his own
terms and abhorcommercialism, he said.For ITC Infotech, Mr. Jaisim said
hewanted to come up with a plan thatwould retain the character of the
oldwarehouses while upgrading them."When I started, the warehousesstank of
tobacco and every road wascovered with asphalt," he said.Three years later,
two dozen of thewarehouses have been modified toseat hundreds of workers
each, andmost of the streets have been pavedwith local stone. The
architectretained the shell of the oldhigh-ceilinged warehouses. Besidesthe
strikingly minimal use of glassand steel, these buildings haveunusual new
touches: walls made ofhollow terra-cotta blocks, flat stonetables and
acoustic-friendly ceilingsthat are fashioned out of earthenpots. The giant
century-old chimney,ancient trees and even an old firestation have been
left standing.One jarring note is the unusualnumber of smokers on the
campus.Unlike other outsourcing firms,where smoking is frowned upon, atthis
subsidiary of India's biggestcigarette maker the practice is
notdiscouraged.The distinctive marks of thecompany's ideas have paid off
for ITCInfotech in unexpected ways."Many employees feel a strongsense of
pride in their uniquecampus," said Anirvan Mukherjee, asystems analyst who
joined ITCInfotech nearly three years ago."One of the high points of
workinghere is the campus," said Mr.Mukherjee, adding that his workplacewas
the envy of all his friends.Mr. Verma said that in Bangalore,where
competition for skilled talent isintense, "Our campus is a
greatdifferentiator."It is a refreshing change from the"clipped, almost
Californian,presentation of the typical campus"said Simon P. Bentley, vice
presidentfor application development at DHL,one of ITC Infotech's
customers. Mr.Bentley said it is a "beautiful oasis inthe midst of the
daily noise anddifficulty" of life in Bangalore. It wasas comfortable and
efficient as hisown offices in Scottsdale, Ariz., hesaid, but with a "more
enviable"natural environment.Aesthetic examples such as ITCInfotech are
rare, said Kamal Sagar,a Bangalore architect whose firm,Total Environment,
prides itself oncreating structures that incorporategreenery and local
building materials."Every company wants to outdo theother," said Mr. Sagar,
citing thespaceship- and Sydney OperaHouse-inspired food courts atInfosys's
headquarters and its plansto build origami-shaped buildings innearby
Mysore. "Companies likeInfosys and Wipro have the power toshape Bangalore's
skyline," he said,"and so they should."
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