Nepotism and all that we need to know about

A deep dive into Nepotism

In the recent few months, among all the topics that have come to the forefront in India, Nepotism has probably gained more controversies and raised more questions than any other. In this article, I am going to try to define nepotism and try to look at it from different perspectives.

What is Nepotism

As per Oxford learner’s Dictionary, Nepotism means, “giving unfair advantages to your own family if you are in a position of power, especially by giving them jobs”. This advantage can be in different ways and forms depending on the industry, sector and context. Two things stand out for me in the definition here. Firstly, the word ‘unfair’ and secondly that there is no notion of competency. ‘Unfair’ is not very quantifiable all the time. It’s relative to the person not getting something. Many a times, afraid of owning up to our limitations, we tend to think that the situation or the superior (in the context of position of power) has been unfair to us by not giving us what we deserve. And other times, it happens that people in power deny someone just to provide the facility to their own. The second notion will be discussed shortly.

Why Nepotism is bad

According to me, there are different ways to look at this problem. As I mentioned earlier, nepotism basically overlooks competency and doing so there might be a lot of talented deserving people who do not get the chance to prove themselves whereas few individuals might get the opportunity only because of the connection they have. This is a pretty big downside of nepotism and is directly relevant to what we saw in the current controversies in Bollywood. But this is not restricted to Bollywood only. In any sector, in any domain, the resource is not infinite. Hence, the chances are limited too. If you want to give a chance to someone, there will be multiples, whom you are putting down. And that’s why, while giving chances to someone of your own might not seem too bad, but in effect, it is putting down several deserving candidates. Not only that, due to the lack of proper talented individuals, that particular industry or sector also get impacted negatively. From these angles, you would definitely say that Nepotism is wrong; we should protest against such cases and so on.

Other side of the coin

But I also try to look at it from a different angle. If you think through, Nepotism in different order of magnitude exists at every level of society. It’s not only the glamour world of bollywood but even in our everyday life that you would find a lot of examples. Many a times, it seems that the children of a doctor, banker or a big businessman get ‘unfair’ advantage just because of who their parents are. The ‘unfairness’ might come in small dosages like giving right advice or providing the right push at the right time. Or sometimes it could be as big advantage as getting hold of a big fortune or a business empire at a ripe age. If you start thinking this way, sometimes even nepotism might not be intended. Whatever profession you are in right now, obviously that will leave an impression on your family, specially your children. People near us get to learn a lot about our profession just being with us and sometime if they choose the same path for career may give them an ‘unfair’ advantage. Sometimes in business, you might feel much safer by sharing and giving responsibilities to someone close to you instead of putting out advert for the best candidate since you might not be able to trust that capable person. These are all situations which I think are unavoidable.

Also, if someone has struggled a lot for their own position of power and as a parent do not want their children to go through the same meticulous struggle, are they wrong in their decision? Someone can argue at either ends. Someone could say that the struggle is integral to the position since that teaches humility and other traits that the child would not have by not having something earned. But on the other hand, someone can also argue, that as parents, it’s our duty to provide our children with every opportunity that we can to facilitate their journeys and most parents do that. What’s wrong in that?

Conclusion

As I tried to put here, Nepotism, like many of our other societal concepts is not a black and white theory. There are many layers to it. It might be easy to put labels onto someone and judge them accordingly but it is hard when we ourselves face similar situations. To me, the idea of “someone should be judged only by their talent and nothing else”, seems utopian- something desirable but might not be ever achieved.