Davos: Confident of India gaining its "rightful place" in coming years on the world stage alongside the US and China, ace banker Uday Kotak has said Indian corporates also need to combine some "animal spirit" with their judicious capital allocation for their own business growth and add to the economy's expansion.
The Kotak group chief, who has steered one of the most successful banking and financial services sector stories in recent years in India, also favoured nudge from the government and policymakers to the corporates to get that "animal spirit" and said the country should also incentivise delta jobs created in any country.
Kotak, who was here to attend the World Economic Forum annual meeting that saw China positioning itself as a new champion of globalisation, told PTI in an interview that India has to take its rightful place over the next 5-10 years and the institutions like his will have to contribute to that journey.
On Indian corporates in the past having started to look overseas for expansion through acquisitions, but the process stopping thereafter, Kotak said, "That also probably because of the reason that they did not necessarily take the best capital decisions and probably our timing was wrong."
Asked whether India Inc has learnt its lessons, he said, "I think, it has. The private sector has become more careful and more sort of thoughtful and therefore, we are seeing a slowdown in investments -- both in terms of external investments as well as within India.
"To a certain extent, we need to get the balance right between judicious capital allocation with a little bit of animal spirit. At this stage, what I would like to see in India is that a little bit of animal spirit in business and entrepreneurs came back.
"A nudge from the government and policymakers that we would love to see growth in businesses and entrepreneurship would certainly be helpful and welcome."
He agreed this would also help many from the start-up ecosystem move to the mainstream business arena.
Kotak further said this balance between judicious capital allocation and 'animal spirit' would need to be a high focus area as the jobs would finally happen only through successful business growth.
Optimistic about job creation, going ahead, Kotak said, "I am a great believer that India should incentivise delta jobs created in any sector."
Asked whether more acquisitions are in store for Kotak group itself, he said, "We are still a small company in global scheme of things.
"My view is that you have to look at business of institution building as a journey and at Kotak, we feel that financial services in India have a huge potential from here and our job is to really serve customers across the length and breadth of the country and build an institution to last."
Asked when he would feel that Kotak is no more a "small company", Kotak said, "That would happen probably when we as Indians can say India has arrived globally. An institution can grow only that much as its country, and I would love to see India being talked in the same breadth as the US and China.
"And my view is that over next 5-10 years, India has to take its rightful place, and institutions like us will have to do our bit in this journey. But the country's success is the core to what we work for and institutions are only a subset of that."
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
