The Khushwant Singh Literary Festival took place between Oct 9 - 11 last week. Indian author, social worker, Chairperson of the Infosys Foundation, Smt. Sudha Murty was a part of the litfest and in conversation with author Chetan Bhagat. They discussed ‘The Art and Science of Giving’.
Sudha Murty uses a landline phone to coordinate with people she works with, especially who are frontline workers helping in Covid testing, ambulance services and more healthcare facilities. Chetan said, “For youngsters who don’t know what a landline is, please Google it.”
Murty’s book ‘3000 Stitches’ starts off with Sudha’s journey into Philanthropy which started with her helping the Devdasis. Commenting on giving money versus giving your own attention and writing a cheque versus choosing to be involved in actual philanthropic work, she said, “You will not understand people if you don’t get involved. If you really go on the spot, work with them, then you realise what their aspirations are. We should never underestimate that we know everything and they do not know. They also know their priority and you should understand that. I learnt a lot more about people by mixing with people, staying with them, eating with them. Poverty means helplessness. It removes your courage. And then, how one can improve and education is the only key and how you can use that key.”
“My father told me, if you could change ten Devdasis in your life, I’ll be very proud if that I gave birth to a daughter who worked for changing the lives of ten people. I took 18 years to change the lives of 3000 people,” she added.
Sudha Murty also said, “When I was married to my husband (Narayan Murty, Infosys Founder), he was unemployed. I don’t belong to a rich family. My father was a doctor. When money came to me I used to ask this question to myself. When I worked with 3000 Devdasis, is when I realized that probably this was the reason money was given to us, to help them.”
From going to male dominated engineering college and being the girl who bobbed her hair, Murty said that people in her society looked down upon her in a doubtful manner. She said, “A girl who has cut her hair, how could she walk the streets with that hair?” But she did.
But why does it take commitment and persistence to help someone? Murty said, “It is easy to help to start, but if you have to get the correct results, you have to work very hard and monitor the progress.”
She also insisted, “Don’t look down upon social work. It requires 100 percent commitment. I travel 20 days in a month and I will be in the deep forest or tribal area. Unless you give that commitment you cannot see the results. So please understand that if you have great compassion and that means you devote your time.”
Chetan asked her that aren’t we letting the government off the hook by doing their job in the name of social work? “I always look at this as - whatever I can do, let me do. Is it my duty or not, I don’t worry, I feel if I wait for somebody to do it, they may or may not survive. Like for migrant workers, we made 100,000 ration kits. I believe we must do what we can do, the government should do what they can do, together we should survive,” she answered.
“You don’t actually need that much money in real life to be happy. To be happy in life with your wife or husband, you require great understanding, and when you do not have that, what is the use of having a big wedding?” Murty said.
She also feels that whatever we do, the next generation will not remember, or after a 100 years, people will not remember. “You should never work so that somebody should remember your great work or sacrifices,” she added.
In a lighter exchange she told Chetan how she told her daughter Akshata Murty (who is married to UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak) that her wedding was similar to 2States (Chetan’s book where a south Indian girl marries a Punjabi). Chetan admired her simplicity and chuckled that if a Punjabi family had someone like Sunak in their family, all of them would run around in VIP cars with red sirens.
