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IntroductionThe common refrain about India is that "it is such a diverse country whatever you say of it, the opposite is equally true". "In India", Stern (1993) observes, you will find "a society that has, like Europe's, the diversities of a continent and the unities of a civilization". Such is the measure of the magnitude of the nature of diversity in Indian society whose features Indian industry had inherited. Societal diversity is not an unmixed blessing for corporations and their management. It is argued that in India, generally speaking, the weaknesses of societal diversity such as caste, for instance, are superimposed on its business and industrial organizations and exacerbated.The marketplace and workforce in India are becoming more diverse every day. In fact, workplace diversity is considered a major challenge and opportunity for human resource management. It makes integration both difficult and easy depending on how diversity is viewed and used. The sources of diversity and its uses make a difference to what it means and how it impinges on organizational purpose and human behaviour at the workplace and beyond. Workplace diversity in India may have been partly inherited from centuries of customs and practices, partly imposed from colonial heritage and largely acquired through corporate omissions and commissions. They have implications for global competitiveness and for managing human resources/ industrial relations (HR/IR).The next section presents an exploratory analysis of the sources of diversity in India and its implications for human resource management. The third section reviews the experiences of select organizations. The final section offers broad conclusions about the major issues and approaches to coping with the emerging challenges during the 1990s and beyond. Sources/dimensions of diversityThe sources of diversity are many in India where tradition co-exists with modernity. Here we discuss salient aspects of demographic, social-cultural, techno-economic and organizational factors that account for diversity in the Indian context.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to assess cognitive, affective, and behavioral reactions of employees to merger and acquisition (M&A) situations.Design/methodology/approachThe paper reports responses of 225 managers of four banks that have gone through mergers (two merger cases), recently in India. Data are collected on a structured questionnaire containing standard scales of leader‐member exchange (LMX), leader communication and employees' reactions to M&As. The psychometric properties of the measures are established before testing the hypotheses.FindingsResults show that affect mediates the relationship between cognitive and behavioral reactions to M&A. Leader communication fully mediates the relationship of the contribution dimension of LMX with cognitive reactions.Research limitations/implicationsThe results have implications for using LMX and communication with the leader in M&A situations. Though, single source data may be a limitation but primary data from real‐life M&A situation is strength of the paper.Originality/valueThe study offers insight into the affective, cognitive and behavioral reactions of employees to merger and acquisition situations.

Focuses on affirmative action programmes in India for people belonging to the scheduled castes and the scheduled tribes in the sphere of employment. The constitutional safeguards and the measures initiated to give effect to them are briefly reviewed. Examines the progress achieved in realizing the goals in terms of the fulfilment of the quotas (i.e. reservation targets) and discusses the problems in implementing the affirmative programmes. The extremely complex Indian experience sheds light on various unique measures initiated to give effect to public policy concerning affirmative action programmes. It affords many lessons for other countries wishing to pursue similar objectives.

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