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Why Are We Chronically Late?

Coordinated By VEENA RAO

An American friend of mine was marking her calendar the other day. She had two engagements that were scheduled for the same time later in the month- a get together with her close family, and a social do with her Indian friends. She wanted to attend both events, and didn’t see why she couldn’t manage that. “You Indians are going to start two hours late anyway,” she said with certainty! 

That is quite a reputation we’ve built for ourselves here, I thought. Why are we chronically late anyway? Is it because we are a hard working lot and try to squeeze in too many things into one day? Is it an age-old tradition that we simply can't seem to shake off? Are we bad at time management? The following are some of the responses I got to my survey questions. 

Pragmatically, because the other person is likely to be late as well.
Socially, because no host wants the guest to arrive exactly on time.
Practically, because our word for tomorrow is the same as yesterday (at
least in a few languages!).
And philosophically, because it is a way of saying time controls us, it is
not we who control it.
Deepika Bahri, Associate Professor in English, Atlanta GA

As per my experience with human behaviors, most latecomers tend to be perfectionists and involved in unnecessary details that makes them overtly busy in their earlier assignments that they get delayed for the current event! Such profiles have challenges in goal-focus, prioritization and delegation. As a result, they may acquire a low self-image, which could orient them to adopt behaviors of 'what others do' in the community rather than doing the 'right thing’!!
Normally such profiles are seeking high acceptance and tend to be people-pleasers leading to over-talk/explanations, which could further add to the misery of delays!!
Mohan Kapur, Productivity Expert, Atlanta GA

People go to work and work related meetings on time. People take their kids to school and soccer practices on time. They even pay their bills on time. In my opinion, Indian-Americans arriving late in this country applies only to our social and cultural events. It is because of our 'attitude’ and lack of respect for our own events and towards the hosts and organizers.  It takes small effort to believe that following the punctuality rule even where Indian events are concerned, is showing respect to our culture and traditions and not otherwise.
Narender Reddy, Commercial Realtor, Atlanta GA

It is a reflection of a deeper malaise rather than an acceptance of IST (Indian Stretchable Time!) It is an expression of a psyche- a certain casualness, an exaggerated sense of self-importance (making an entry ensures glances) and a general lack of respect for authority!
Samir Das, Senior Executive, Atlanta GA

In my view, Indians are warm, loving and emotional people. But we tend to care for our family members, friends etc. We don't have much civic sense. In our schools too, we are not taught citizenship, civic responsibilities etc. So, we don't grow up with much civic sense. In India, I've seen a chic woman eating a banana and throwing the peel on the road. I've seen educated, well-dressed men in posh cars throwing things on the road. I think coming late is just a bad habit, like littering public places.
Atika Nadaf, Writer/ESL Instructor, Toronto Canada

In my sophomore year at Edinboro, University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Babbit, a sociology professor, visited the Sind University as visiting professor. He returned after a while and published his study on Time Perception. It was embarrassing. He divided his study into three sections- faculty, students, and functionaries. According to the study, the faculty was punctual 83% of the time for religious activities, 5% for social activities, and 3% for work activities. Students were punctual 68% of the time for religious activities, 3 % for social functions and 3 % for work activities. Functionaries were punctual 74% of the time for religious activities, 3% for social activities, and 21% for work activities.
My personal story involves a ninth grade soccer practice in Sind, where a boy from England was told to meet us at 8:00 a.m. We showed up at 10:00 a.m., and he had left at 9:00! He was puzzled that we were late.
Hasan Ali, Financial Advisor, Atlanta GA

We are typically late in arriving at parties because we want to look fashionable but actually do not care about other people who may have other things to do afterwards. Being habitually late is really bad manners but too many otherwise decent Indian people practice it, often throwing the hostess's plans out of gear. Those who appear on time are seen as type A. At the Anup Jalota concert recently, he and Anuradha Paudwal were ready, but waited for a crowd to gather. Everything ended around 1 a.m., making life difficult for the not so healthy folks present.
Dr Indrani Dutta-Gupta, Defense Contractor, Roswell GA

Because we take pride in the Indian Stretchable Time. Everything in India is always late; train arrivals, flights taking off, stores opening, movies starting, officers reaching work, guests arriving at parties -- there is always an excuse, weather, traffic, children's sickness, maid's absence, technical snafus, anything will do. We are used to waiting patiently and helplessly in queues, bus stops, train stations, waiting rooms, so much so that we are desensitized to the concept of tardiness.
At the first party we were invited to, we reached on the dot of the time specified. To our embarrassment, the hosts were barely ready, and the other guests didn't arrive till an hour afterwards, and were still arriving when we left some four hours later. The next party was in a restaurant, so, thinking that there would be some time constraints, we again arrived on time, only to find that the hosts had not yet arrived. They rushed in after about half an hour, with all their party decorations in hand and started to set up the place. We murmured some excuse and disappeared into a mall for an hour or so, by which time the party had started in full swing. A few more episodes of this nature and we picked up the ropes. Now we are fashionably late by one or two hours to every party we are invited to, and don't even feel the need to apologize. In fact, if ever a guest arrives at our own parties on time, we are thrown off synch. Maybe that is how being late has become a part of our tradition.
Mala Chakraborty PhD, Senior Business Devpt  Analyst, Suwanee GA

It may have something to do with our easygoing, chalta hai attitude in India. If the train is going to be late as usual, why bother reaching the station on time? Plus, since things there don't work as efficiently, we often have no choice. We continue doing it in this country because, I suppose, old habits die-hard. If everybody else is coming late to the party, it would be a little embarrassing to show up on time and be the only when there. So we also end up going late.
Murali Kamma, Freelance Writer, Atlanta GA

According to me, we don’t know how to manage our time effectively. I think in general, we don’t plan our time well. We have reached late so often that it has become a habit not to take deadlines/timings seriously.
Aanchal Lalwani, Marketing Specialist, Norcross GA

We Indians believe in eternity, so what difference is a delay of an hour going to make? IST does not stand for Indian Standard Time but Indian Stretchable Time! The convincing argument is “No body else is on time, so why should I be”? Some set their clocks and watches twenty minutes behind the actual time, to buy extra twenty minutes! Sometimes you may be late and still not miss the train or bus because the train or bus is also running late! I feel people come late just to impress others that they have lot to do.
Mahadev Desai, Freelance Writer, Atlanta GA

Most of the world is laid back and counts the passage of time in terms of days or even weeks. It’s only the western, industrialized society that is driven by the clock and counts living from minute to minute. So we Indians are in the majority.
Rajesh Rao, Software Engineer, San Diego CA

I think we Indians are an evolved lot. We have actually crossed the fourth dimension of time and freed ourselves from its shackles. Clock watching is for the drones of this world. Time to get up, time to work, time to eat, time to party, time to smile, time to sleep, etc. How can you ever really enjoy something if you always ration your involvement in it with respect to time? 
As a race we are easygoing and casual in our approach to time. Punctuality is definitely not our middle name. And keeping time to the nearest minute is quite against our system of living and thinking.
We must have loved the era of the hourglass and the sundial. ‘Hey, the sun is still up in the sky- so I made it on time!’ Clocks and watches were bad news for us as it exposed our ‘take it easy’ approach. But thank God for small mercies like the cell phones today- an invention primarily tailored to Indian needs. Now you can actually be fashionably and legally late with notice! “I’m caught in a traffic jam – will be with you in 10 minutes!” Or “you guys go ahead, I’ll catch up with you!” 
Kalpita C. Sarkar, Freelance writer/ Consulting Editor, New Delhi, India

We still sustain as a mystic culture that is known for its paradoxical views. And why not? We are the largest democracy on Earth. We are globally known for mathematical precision, proven in the success of the information technology realm i.e. digital punctuality. Yet we are "fashionably late" everywhere. We like making grand entries at events. Certain things haven’t changed since the colonial era- like our continued quests for portable water and electricity.
Viren Mayani, Media Personality, Atlanta GA

The most common cause for our delay is trying to do too many things in our desire to get ahead in all fields. Do not miss the fact that our wives need more time to get ready in most cases, and at the last minute they insist that the husband should change. For meetings, we need to revise our presentations at the last minute. One ‘valid’ reason that has caused me to be late most times is the nonstop ringing of my cell phone. We attend each call even if it means being late to an appointment because we do not want to be rude ( our Indian tradition to be nice). We come from a background, where life was simple with not much need for prioritizing. Also, we hop from one social engagement to another just so that our visit is recorded. And now that the community has grown, there are just too many functions to run to. Last but not the least, most of us are professionals with higher levels of obligations, especially when we have our own business to run. We certainly do not want to miss that last mighty $ even if it means being late again!
Dr Pawan K. Rattan, MD, Tampa FL
Not everyone of Indian origin is late - I know some people like my husband who are always on time, which makes me wonder if it is a cultural factor. In my family of origin too, there were differences: my brother has always been an on time person... but I remember being mesmerized by my father's quotation of Swami Vivekananda, who said "...We live in eternity, not in time," - it seemed to me, eternity was more valuable than time! could it be, that such loftiness and grandiosity had an impact on little me?
More recently, I did an analysis of time and what it means to people: some people like those of us in India who seem to not value it(time) , see time as a cyclical phenomenon - an example would be fisher -folk who work with the tides, or people who work at home with cyclical tasks of caring and feeding ( polychronous cultures) versus those who live monochronous cultures, where time is seen in a single dimension. Time is seen as a commodity by some, to not be wasted, but saved, managed, made and gained. In a world that has elements of both polychronicity and commodification (of time) I find myself moving back and forth on my values. Add to this, the constant strive to improve ourselves and our health. More 'time' is needed for exercise, study and relationships. Phew!
It does seem easier to cop out and live in eternity.
Anu Rao, Ombudsman, Atlanta, GA
Indians like feeling important, so the "high" on making a grand entry. Doesn't matter if we are Late. Secondly, some of us lack the self confidence to be the first to show up, so the orchestrated delay.
Paromita Sengupta, Journalist, Kolkata, India

I'd have to say that we're late simply because of habit. Nothing else explains why even for functions occurring on Saturdays and Sundays, people routinely show up an hour to two hours late.
That being the case, we and our close friends made a pact a few years ago that when one of us is having an event, we're going to be no more than 20-30 minutes late (with a good excuse!).
Beyond that, I'd have to say that there's a tendency in the older lot (moms and dads, first-generation Indian-Americans) to make a grand and fashionable entrance. Nothing makes people feel more superior than to know that someone's been waiting for them. It's almost like you're not important and had nothing else to do if you showed up on time. The "socialite" aunties need to be late because this is just another function they have to attend on a busy weekend.
Gagan Nirula, Marketing & Communications Specialist, Burtonsville, MD 
A false sense of self importance, a casual "chalta hai" approach to life- reinforced by prevailing social norms in India. IST equals Indian Standard Time (according to which all trains should depart at least half an hour late otherwise they will run near empty, most passengers having missed boarding  them!). Another reason could be trying to do too much in too short a time. Could also be lack of basic transport facility in rural India, or the right mental attitude, or not understanding the importance attached by others for timeliness. Some Very Important People go late on purpose, to satisfy their own ego. But this is negative importance.
Vineet Sharma, Mechanical Engineer, Canton, OH

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