Infosys founder N R Narayana Murthy had said that Indians should embrace a 70 hour work week. This statement wasn’t received well by many. Recently, in an interview With CNBC-TV18, Murthy defended his statement, emphasising that hard work is needed in a country where many are in demanding professions such as farming and factory work.
Speaking on the criticism he received for his statement, he said, “I rationalised it this way. If anybody that has performed much better than me in their own field, not necessarily in my field, I would respect, I would call them, and I would say, where do you think I was wrong in saying this? But I didn’t find. A lot of my western friends, a lot of NRIs, a lot of good people in India called me, and without exception, they were all very happy.”
Defending this, he gave reference of the hard work that the less privileged in India put in. Murthy said, “The issue is that we have to work hard in this country because the poor farmer works very hard. You know, the poor factory worker works very hard. So, therefore, those of us who received education at a huge discount, thanks to the subsidy from the government for all these education, owe it to the less fortunate citizens of India to work extremely hard.”
Sudha Murthy seconded his statement and gave an example from her own family. She said, “My father used to work more than 70 hours a week. My sister is a doctor. She also works more than 70 hours. Murthy has worked 90 hours a week.”
The Infosys founder also shared how he too worked for six and a half days, a week. Sharing, “I used to go six and a half days. Even in the electronics area, I used to work six and a half days. And every day I would leave home at 6 am in the morning. I would be in the office at 6.20. And I would leave by about 8.15, 8.30 pm.”
Murthy did share that his words are not all up in the air. He believes in leading by example. Thus, he stated, “One thing I have followed is that whatever advice I have given to others, I think by and large I have followed it. I have not given advice to people without having done it myself.”
He also shared from his own four decade long career, how he worked for 70 hours every week. In fact, until 1994, Murthy used to work for 85 to 90 hours every week since Infosys used to work for 6 days a week back then.