Floods hit India's IT hubs, wash away some credibility

If your Indian suppliers aren't at their most responsive, or you've spent a bit of time on hold to a business process outsourcer over the weekend, look to the heavens for an explanation.

Indians are certainly looking in that direction because the nation has experienced deluges in the last few days, with the result being floods in notable IT hubs.

In Gurgaon, a city on Delhi's outskirts famed for housing call centres, offices of IT multinationals and a cloud of startups, floods made it more-or-less impossible to travel on Friday and Saturday. Neighbouring local authorities pointed fingers at each other's supposedly lax drain-dredging operations as motorists fumed in traffic jams that went nowhere for five, six or more hours.

Closing schools didn't help matters so local employers either asked staff to work from home or waited for staff to arrive whenever possible.

In the higher-profile IT hub of Bengalaru, the same rains led to local lakes overflowing onto roads and housing developments built to cater to IT workers. Travel was also reportedly difficult in the souther city, with absenteeism again reportedly high.

India's press is already wringing its hands over the floods' potential impact on the nation's reputation as a place to run technology businesses, as the amount of rain was not unusual. The nation's infrastructure refreshment plans and overall governance are being called into question.

The nation's governments are less concerned about those matters for now, preferring to focus on those displaced by the floods in other parts of the nation. ®