The Fallen Star

A perfect storybook example of American dream, Rajat Gupta crafted his illustrious journey in global corporate world by sheer endeavor and meritocracy, and he was the first Indian to be the CEO of McKinsey and Company at a time when heading a global MNC by any Indian was literally unheard of. With his meteoric success stories Rajat Gupta became an epitome of corporate hero who despite being orphaned at 18 earned degrees from elite institutes such as IIT and Harvard and joined McKinsey in early 70's. Since then he never looked back. Mr Gupta also became the board members of global corporate giants like McKinsey, Goldman Sachs, Proctor and Gamble, and AMR. But one fine day his understanding of ethics on corporate governance got blurred and he divulged insider information of Goldman Sachs board meeting to his friend and business partner Raj Rajaratnam, founder of Galleon Group. And the rest is an open book of trials and tribulations that he yearned from pumping out his affinity for greed.

Sometimes, I wonder why these demi-gods of society fall prey to mundane traps? Few more million bucks, more greed, and what not? Is that a gold standard of life that drives us crazy to do the unthinkable? Mr Gupta may be a brilliant Wall Street executive who has garnered both puffs and prestige for his meritocracy, but as a lesser mortal, he is no different than an ordinary criminal who springs into unlawful action by the trigger of a small bait. Why I am becoming a little harsher here is that today I just listened into the wiretap of FBI and the evidence against him for passing inside information is unmistakeably overwhelming. As a trusted board member of Goldman and Sachs he has breached the fundamental code of ethics. What it evokes now as how he could able to rise and rise for over three decades without any hurdle and the secret here is his dirty networking skills that propelled his tempo of corporate journey. For all his magical networking skills and relations with high and mighty in the corporate world and beyond he reached the acme, but the nadir was not far behind.

When FBI tapped the suspicious conversations between him and Rajaratnam, his facade broke into pieces like a piece of glass. Although Gupta was not directly involved in the trading in which Rajaratnam heaped one million profit; nevertheless, the modus operandi was more than suspicious. As a responsible corporate citizen he established a bad precedent, which is unforgivable. But here is a contrast, when Gupta was convicted for his crime on last Friday (June 15, 2012), another Indian-American Preet Bharara, the US Attorney in Manhattan, was the man who probed into this insider trading crime and stood unperturbed by the stellar image of Gupta. And the pointed difference is a matter of honesty and integrity, not the mundane achievements.