Mumbai: Corporate thought leader and
Infosys co-founder NR
Narayana Murthy has flayed the high wage hikes that senior managements have been apportioning to themselves when the software industry is in trying times and has advised them to make “sacrifices” to maintain common man’s faith in capitalism.
Conceding that times are difficult for IT services sector, Murthy dismissed commonly attributed threats of artificial intelligence and automation as “more hype than reality”. Terming the trend of no hikes for juniors and freshers as “worrisome,” Murthy rued that the senior level people have been taking handsome hikes.
“I think that is not the way to make capitalism acceptable to the larger masses in a country that has huge poverty,” he said, speaking at the IIT-Bombay over the weekend.
Murthy, a strong proponent of “compassionate capitalism” since his days in the company, did not make any reference to Infosys. It can be noted that over the past few months, Murthy had gone public with his displeasure over senior executive compensation at Infosys. Speaking before the students at the prestigious institute, Murthy said in the last seven years, salaries of freshers in the software industry have stayed stagnant while the same for senior-level employees have grown by up to 1,000%. “If all of us make sacrifices, then the youngsters will understand.”
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