MNCs keep offshoring plans under wraps

NEW DELHI: Politicization of the outsourcing issue and making it sound like ‘moving American jobs to a low cost center in another country (read India)’ has led to several causalities and the one to suffer the biggest blow is corporate transparency.

Squeezed between the economic sense of outsourcing, the business need to wriggle out of backlash and being seen as supporting people’s cause in the country, American MNCs are not only holding back their plans, they are keeping their existing outsourcing activities under cover.

According to Resident Scholar of American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, Norman J Ornstein, many large companies are taking tactical decisions to hold back their outsourcing plans, particularly to destinations in the Asian region. "No big company wants to have a headline that throws light on big number of jobs being outsourced to other destinations," he said categorically. Ornstein was speaking at a Nasscom speaker club series in Delhi.

Talking about the various anti-outsourcing bills he said that while a lot of bills that have been introduced not all of them would be passed. Ornstein was also hopeful that in the days to come, as the Indian economy grows, the two countries would see more bilateral trade happening in the region. He, however, cautioned India to be sensitive about this whole issue and not place itself in a situation like Japan or China.

Nasscom President Kiran Karnik, as usual, continued with the typical rhetoric "there is no big threat with regards to outsourcing orders from the US." While stressing that Nasscom does not see any big threat, he accepted that the industry, nevertheless, was concerned.

"There are companies who don’t want to be in the limelight when it comes to outsourcing," he said adding that things will improve once the election gets over in the US.

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