Diversity needs a DARE

Gaurav Kumar

"India- Unity in Diversity"
It might look as one of the most repetitive and banal affirmation for anyone who has grown up reading in and about indian culture.
I do not know how many people agree with my questions on this adage.
Aren't we done with just boasting of what all we have and how did we manage to remain a THIRD WORLD COUNTRY (I am sorry for being rude).

I beileve it's time to act , time to use this diversity towards development. We are land of innumerable cults and religions, almost 1600 languages including dailects. We are a country where a significant population of the land doesnt understand national anthem.Do you know why do we have cloth stiching business going on in India.. because how many types of dhoti, lungi, ghagra, bandhez will you form readymade companies for.

Having all this retiterated, lets face some bitter facts:
-India ranks 114 out of 134 countries on gender gap which calls for a reality check on equality complaince in employment, health and education.
- There are no mandates on diversity as such for companies in India
- only 14% of disabled population has an employement
- There are still no mandates on reservation for disabled people in private companies.

Keeping the discussion with context to diversity at workplace
Diversity refers to the variety arising out of educational, cultural, racial, ethnic, age, religious and gender differences. The essence of diversity is the acceptance, exploration and leveraging of these differences in a safe, positive and nurturing environment. That means having an open mindset, being inclusive, giving legitimacy to these differences and accepting them with a positive mindset.

Many companies look at diversity from a very narrow perspective. They focus on helping disadvantaged groups, essentially with the objective of being politically correct. That is unfortunate because diversity is a much more powerful concept that if leveraged effectively can yield tangible business benefits. Indeed, diversity initiatives will not be sustainable unless they are designed to make an impact on the business.

Extending to it, at all our companies we should be awarness how a differently abled person makes it to sit next to us, why should we not put one step ahead to ensure his/her inclusion and why should the disability empowerment not only be limited to recruiting a miniscule percentage at work places, rather than how we build a barrier free world around us with all of us being sensitized to the difference , the Diversity around us.

DARE INDIA has accounted of the historic statement and wish to modify it to "Development with Diversity"