Sunit Prakash & Lalita Kasanji
Wellington, August 15, 2021
India is a global IT powerhouse, and we know that its tech professionals have contributed to developed nations since at least the 1970s.
New Zealand too has been a beneficiary of this immense talent, and from the development of its earliest systems and infrastructure, through to the current fibre rollout, Indian IT professionals have played a significant role.
Our investigations revealed very little by way of documentation or acknowledgement and the purpose of this chapter is to tell their stories and correct this omission in a small way.
Drawing on conversations with twelve of the earliest IT professionals who arrived from India in the 1980s and early 1990s, we showcase their contribution, highlight seven common themes, make two key recommendations to benefit New Zealand further, and identify several areas to build on these stories.
Early migrants from India
Economic changes, driven by the British presence in India in the 1800s forced men to seek better prospects. Indian seafarers who came to New Zealand returned home with news of opportunities in the country and the first migrants started arriving. Starting as scrub cutters, roadbuilders and farm labourers, with sheer hard work, enterprise and community assistance, they soon started their own fruit and vegetable businesses (Kasanji 1982).
The macroeconomic situation in New Zealand at the arrival of the initial cohort of Indian IT professionals
To understand the contribution Indian IT professionals made, it is critical to understand what New Zealand was going through at the time.
State of New Zealand
New Zealand had lost its guaranteed export market when Britain joined the European Economic Union in 1973. The oil crisis also began, and welfare costs doubled on account of the introduction of Domestic Purposes Benefit (1973), Accident Compensation Commission (1974), and revision of the National Superannuation scheme (1977).
In 1975, the National Party came to power. To keep the economy afloat and combat rising inflation and unemployment, the then Prime Minister Robert Muldoon introduced a price freeze, and put restrictions on wages and foreign currency. Import tariffs continued and subsidies were introduced to protect local agriculture. Resentment of the State’s size and degree of control over people’s lives eventually created a mood for change.
Radical market reforms
The David Lange-led Labour government took power following a snap election in 1984 and profoundly transformed the country’s economic landscape. The introduction of radical market reforms and social policy were dubbed ‘Rogernomics,’ after controversial Finance Minister Roger Douglas.
Labour’s introduction of the State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) Act (1986) overhauled New Zealand’s state sector. Government departments were corporatised and restructured to become efficient and profitable. The New Zealand Post Office, a prime target of these reforms, was replaced by three SOEs — New Zealand Post, Telecom and PostBank. The latter two eventually were sold to the private sector.
The GST regime
The government abolished many economic controls, removed farm subsidies, radically reformed the centrally organised welfare system and in 1986 introduced the Goods and Service Tax (GST). As the state sector shrank, unemployment rose, the stock market crashed in 1987 though the Labour government continued its free-market policies. The pace of reforms was unsustainable, and David Lange resigned in 1989. The National Party came to power in 1990, inheriting a very different New Zealand.
In 1991, National’s Finance Minister Ruth Richardson presented the ‘Mother of all Budgets.’
It deregulated and privatised the telecommunication and electricity sector, established Crown Health Enterprises (CHE) and Regional Health Authorities (RHA), slashed welfare payments, and introduced user-pays in hospitals and schools. Social and economic reform in New Zealand was faster and more wide-ranging than almost anywhere else in the world.
The rise of IT in India
Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister, created and nurtured institutes of national importance. Two of these, the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) Kolkata and Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) Mumbai, initiated India’s entry into the computational world.
In 1956, ISI became the first organisation in India to acquire a computer, followed by TIFR in 1964, and then the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kanpur in 1965.
The private sector was also becoming aware of the new opportunities offered by computing and software and recognising its need to centralise data processing for their various companies, Tatas set up Tata Consultancy Service (TCS) in 1968 with its first three computers. In 1971, Delhi Cotton Mills (DCM) began a new division to capitalise on these emerging opportunities.
IBM had already established a presence in India, and by the time of its exit in 1977, India’s first generation of programmers and computer engineers had arrived.
As computer networking became increasingly necessary, the first Wide Area Network was set up, linking computers at TIFR and VJTI (Victoria Jubilee Technical Institute) Mumbai in 1977.
In South India, Western India Palm Refined Oil (Wipro) Limited seized the opportunity created by IBM’s exit to build their own minicomputers and microcomputers (Sharma 2015).
Acceleration under Rajiv Gandhi
When Rajiv Gandhi became prime minister in 1984, tech-friendly policies further accelerated India’s transformation into an IT superpower and equipped its students and professionals with internationally desirable technical skills.
His government established the Centre for Development of Telematics in August 1984 to develop state-of-the-art technology and modernise the telecommunication network, reduced import quotas, taxes and tariffs on computers and networking equipment.
It was against this backdrop in the two countries that Indian IT professionals arrived in New Zealand, with the skills, knowledge and experience ready to help shape its tectonic restructure.
We surveyed the earliest arriving and most senior Indian IT professionals we could find, namely, Raghavan Vinjimoore, Partha Sarathy, Sudhir Motwani, Ajay Dubey, Lalit Mohan, Raghu Raman, Karun Shenoy, Sunil Mirchandani, Vinny Venkatesh, Michael Konnoth, Sunit Prakash and Vikas Gupta. Many of them studied or worked at the institutions or organisations listed earlier (ISI, IIT, VJTI, TCS and DCM, among many others).
We surmise that there is probably less than two degrees of separation between global captains of the tech industry in the US and their cohort in New Zealand, which must be an opportunity in its own right, and underscores the quality of talent and skills gained by New Zealand.
Sunit Prakash is a Wellington-based IT professional, who coaches, guides and mentors skilled migrants. A postgraduate in Business Administration (MBA) from (NMIMS, Bombay University), he is a member of IT Professionals NZ and a Chartered IT Professional. Lalita Kasanji completed her Masters in Sociology (MA) from Victoria University of Wellington, examining the settlement of the Gujarati community in Wellington and its integration into New Zealand society. She played a key role in establishing the Ethnic Affairs Service in the early 1990s.
Additional Reading: here.
