Opinion Always late? Blame your parents, the boss, and the traffic

But why? How did lateness, an inconvenience to all involved, turn into an unspoken national agreement?

An inheritance

Remember when home clocks were set a few minutes ahead on purpose? We grew up discounting five to 10 minutes from whatever the clock was showing. This ambiguity gave us the illusion of greater control over our lives against the otherwise relentless march of time.

Lateness has been passed down like a family heirloom, a collective understanding that, in India, being “on time” is negotiable.

At the heart of this lateness is our culture, which derives its strength from strong community relationships. To us, being sociable often trumps being punctual. If a colleague stops by to discuss their manager issues, you drop your work and listen. If this leads to another meeting to delay, so be it; people can adjust. Community precedes the clock.

Then there is the all-purpose excuse – the traffic. Even though all the cities in India resemble a giant under-construction site, in this age of Google Maps, where travel times can be predicted with precision, better planning still seems elusive.

This lax approach isn’t limited to work. Take Indian weddings – not only do we have multiple events spread across weeks, but they invariably never start on time.

The office theatre of time

It is in the workplace, however, that our elastic relationship with time takes its most artistic form. Given our collectivist culture, there’s a deep deference to hierarchy. If the boss arrives 15 minutes late to a meeting, no one bats an eye. And just as employees are packing up for the day, managers can just as suddenly remember “urgent” work to review, goodbye evening plans. On the flip side, there are casual employees for whom deadlines stretch like rubber bands. Instead of doing focused, meaningful work, they seek distractions — endless scrolling, coffee breaks, gossip.

And finally, there is the meeting mirage. Those who join meetings on time are rewarded with 5–10 minutes of wait time while others slowly trickle in. The meeting runs over, causing the next one to start late. The cycle repeats. Everyone adjusts. No one apologises. Calendars groan under the weight of carry-forwards.

Of course, this relaxed approach to time comes with its costs. Deadlines are missed, meetings drag endlessly, and productivity suffers. As India aspires to global leadership, it continues to struggle with this self-imposed handicap of lateness. Our GDP per worker ranks among the lowest in the world.

Business leaders clearly see this gap and now demand longer work hours, with some suggesting 70 or even 90-hour workweeks. With ghost work being the norm, they don’t realise they are simply demanding more hours of wasted time.

A call to action

So, why are we Indians always late? Because we have always been so and society has rewarded us for it. It is cultural, it’s social, it’s good economics and yes, sometimes, it is just laziness dressed up as helplessness.

But it may be time for a reset. Imagine combining our resilience, our legendary adaptability with respect for time. Imagine meetings that begin and end as scheduled, managers who value team members’ evenings as much as their own. Wouldn’t we lead more balanced, productive, and fulfilling lives?

To be all that, we don’t need to radically change our lives or leave our sense of community and strong relationships. We just need to add respect for time to the mix. Let IST not stand for Indian Stretchable Time but for Indian Standard Trust, let it stand for reliability and not delays.

The change, as the cliche runs, does begin with you.

Khare is zonal head, HR, at Godrej Properties, and the author of The Time Energy Toolkit: Design Your Life, One Day at a Time (Westland)