ASSIGNMENT NO 1

MOIZ ALI ABBAS

SP18-BBA-165

SYED ASHAR RAZA

SP18-BBA-121

Countries Influenced strongly by Religion

Well over 20 percent countries in the world have some official state religion. But in some countries
religion plays it role more than some set of beliefs or a spiritual path to follow.

India and Pakistan two neighboring countries got independence in August 1947 from the same rulers.
Both countries are dominated by religious groups mainly RSS and TTP.

The core difference between both nations in terms of culture stems from their political culture for the
most part, as the politics of both countries shape their respective citizens and the different state of the
governments of both countries impacted their citizens differently.

Pakistan was made up of Sindh, Punjab, Balochistan, Bangladesh, and the Northwest Frontier Provinces.
India was made up of over fifteen disparate regions. Both countries had poor literacy rates (15%) and a
large majority religion: Islam and Hinduism, respectively.

How cultural differences influence business practices

In Pakistan

As a state created specifically for Muslims, Pakistan has long had Islamic activists advocating for more
thorough Islamisation of that country, and specifically for the elimination of riba. But the country has
also had Islamic modernists and secularists in positions of influence and "generations of Muslim usage
and custom supported by the fatwa of respected ulema that held low rates “.  Islamist hoped to make
Pakistan "a new Medina" which would become "the leader of the Islamic world in the twentieth century, a
laboratory where experiments in Islamic modernity would be successfully conducted en route' to ushering a
new Islamic renaissance".

In India

Hinduism is considered as a sort of guide, and people never break rules of Hinduism just to gain
business advantages. Instead, the Western societies are less prone in connecting the religion
and the business, because they consider these ideas belonging to different worlds. For example
some Western managers can be very religious during Sundays but when they have to close a
deal they would do whatever it is necessary in order to gain money.

How cultural differences influence cost of doing business in each country

As for countries like Pakistan and India cost of doing business on the basis of cultural values many
factors play important role to run a business in these countries.

As these are countries with high context cultures

So while doing business Religion (festivals), manners and values should be kept in eye

As both countries have different religion and values for example main festivals of Pakistan are Eids,
Ramzan and Muharram months so while considering these days value and importance for Muslims, an
international company can apply their cost, strategy , planning , decision making and implementation on
their business

We can take example of MacDonald’s for both countries as it is a MNC and in Pakistan they provide food
menu including beef and chicken burgers and in Ramzan they provide sehr and iftar deals while fast
(roza) time duration they do not provide food respecting Muslim values.

And in India they do not provide burgers with beef it will damage their religion values so, they provide
vegetable burgers mostly and chicken to non-vegan people.

Another aspect of countries culture while doing business is their economic, social and financial
infrastructure.

As a company would like to do business in a corrupt free demanding environment where people
demands that and they are willing to pay modern trends. Both countries are ranking upwards
continuously last few years.

But in Pakistan we have example of businesses which are not been opened yet in India they are

Because companies afraid to put their cost where there is chance of corruption, allegations and business
to shut down due to lack of customers interested

For example Facebook has not opened their offices in Pakistan which can produce a lot of opportunity
for youngsters but they are afraid to open because most of time companies investment got in vain due
to turning illegal in Pakistan like cryptocurrency, YouTube for a while and e gaming . While these
companies are putting their investments in India due to good face of India towards world and not facing
any hurdles of being illegal.
But on the other side in Pakistan it’s easy for MNC’s to put investment due to dollar rate in Pakistan is
quite high than India so, it’s cheaper in cost for doing business in Pakistan

So cost of doing business in India and Pakistan depends on these different factors and points as
explained above.