CASES STUDIED

1. AJAY PIRAMAL -PIRAMAL ENTERPRISES LIMITED

Ajay Piramal is the Chairman of Piramal Enterprises Limited, India.

From owning what was then an almost defunct textile company, Piramal today is
the Chairman of Rs.4,000 crore group, comprising Nicholas Piramal, the fourth -
largest pharmaceutical company in India, Morarjee Weaving and Spinning and
Gujarat Glass.

In 1988, he heard from a friend that Nicholas Laboratories, an Australian

MNC that was exiting India, is up for sale. There were many large suitors but
Piramal decided to meet Mike Barker, the man in charge of selling the company,
and told him that he had no track record, was only 33, but was confident of
achieving his dream of putting Nicholas among the top five pharma companies
in India (from 48th at that time). Barker laughed with disbelief but decided to
sell the company to him after hearing out the "young and untried entrepreneur's"
turnaround plan. He took the company to a place among the top five
pharmaceutical companies in India through a string of overseas acquisitions like
the Indian subsidiaries of Roche, Boehringer Mannheim, Rhone Poulenc, ICI
and Hoechst Research Centre.

Piramal says proudly that a decade later he went to see Barker in

retirement in Kenya armed with Nicholas' annual report which showed that the
company was among the top five pharma companies in India. Ajay Piramal
draws his inspiration from “Foot prints on the sands of time”. This story, writes
Business Standard, has acted as a guiding spirit for him.
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2. AMAR BOSE - BOSE CORPORATION

Amar Gopal Bose born in 1929 is the Founder Chairman of Bose

Corporation. An American electrical engineer of Bengali descent, he was listed
on the 2007 Forbes 400 with a net worth of $1.8 billion. The child of an Indian
Bengali father and white American mother, Bose was born and raised in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Bose graduated from Abington Senior High School
and entered the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, graduating with a BS in
Electrical Engineering in the early 1950s. Bose spent a year in Eindhoven,
Netherlands, in the research labs at NV Philips Electronics and a year in Delhi,
India, as a Fulbright student. He completed his Ph.D. in electrical engineering
from MIT, writing a highly mathematical thesis on non-linear systems.

Following graduation, Bose took a position at MIT as an Assistant

Professor. He focused his research on acoustics, leading him to invent a stereo
loudspeaker that would reproduce, in a domestic setting, the dominantly
reflected sound field that characterizes the listening space of the audience in a
concert hall.

Bose was awarded significant patents in two fields which, to this day, are
important to the Bose Corporation. These patents were in the area of loud
speaker design and non-linear, two-state modulated, Class-D, power processing.

To found his company in 1964, for initial capital, he turned to angel

investors including his MIT thesis advisor and Professor, Dr. Y. W. Lee (who
invested his life savings on the effort). Today, the Bose Corporation is a
multifaceted entity with more than 12,000 employees, worldwide, that produces
products for home, car, and professional audio, as well as conducts basic
research in acoustics, automotive systems, and other fields. In addition to
running his company, Bose remained a Professor at MIT until 2000.
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3. S. ANANTHARAMAKRISHNAN – AMALGAMATION GROUP

Sivasailam Anantharamakrishnan (1905–1964), affectionately called "J"

was an Indian industrialist and business tycoon who founded and led the
Amalgamations Group of industries from 1945 to 1964.

EARLY YEARS WITH SIMPSON AND COMPANY

Anantharamakrishnan joined Simpsons Group, a British-owned South

Indian business conglomerate as Secretary in 1935. He became one of the three
directors and the only Indian director (the other two being European) in the
board of Simpsons group when Sir Alexander MacDougall, Chairman of
Simpson's, and W.W. Ladden, Managing Director of the Company founded a
holding company in 1938. Anantharamakrishnan's induction marked the partial
Indianization of Simpsons group which was, till then, completely owned by
Europeans. The very next year, it was converted into a public limited company.
This eventually became the Amalgamations Group in 1941.

EXPANSION OF THE AMALGAMATIONS GROUP

In 1922, John Oakshott Robinson of Spencer's had purchased the Madras

newspaper The Madras Mail and the Higginbotham's and merged the companies
with his printing company Associated Printers and the Spencer's to form the
Associated Publishers. In 1945, Anantharamakrishnan purchased Associated
Publishers on behalf of Amalgamations and added the new companies to the
group. According to popular Chennai historian S. Muthiah, the successful
takeover was the result of an overheard conversation at a Hotel Connemara. This
takeover is regarded as over of the biggest business deals of post-colonial
Madras.

During the period 1938–1955, the group also promoted a finance

company called Simpson and General Finance, an advertising company (Madras
Advertising Company), Wheel-Precision Forgings, Speed-a-way and
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Wallaces Castwright. India Piston was established in 1949. Addison Paints and
Chemicals were established in 1947. With Indian independence and
Indianization of commercial establishments in the country, the Europeans in the
board left handing the company to Indians. Consequently, Anantharamakrishnan
became the Chairman of the Amalgamations group in 1953.
Anantharamakrishnan died an untimely death on April 18, 1964 at the age of
fifty-nine.

4. ANIL AGARWAL – VEDANTA GROUP

Agarwal has travelled a long way, from the Patna lad who left school at
15 to founder, Chairman of the $10 billion conglomerate Vedanta Resources.

“One of the most thrilling moments of my life was the day I got my first
cycle,” reminisces Anil Agarwal, founder Chairman of the London Stock
Exchange-listed mining and metals conglomerate with a market cap of $10
billion. The cycle, a gift from his father, a fabricator of grills and gates in small-
town Patna in the 1960s, meant the youngster could ride to his municipal school
in style, instead of making the daily 10 km hike on foot. Much later, Agarwal
graduated to a Vespa scooter, but never made it to college. Agarwal came to
Mumbai as a scrap-metal dealer in 1976, going on to build an empire in copper,
zinc, aluminium and iron ore, recently venturing into power generation.

Vedanta Resources was the only Indian group to go for a primary listing
on the London Stock Exchange in 2003 and its subsidiary, Sterlite Industries,
was listed on NYSE in 2007 in the largest IPO in the US by an Indian company.
The tipping point came in 2003. Frustrated with the licence raj regime and the
constraints of raising capital in India, Agarwal had earlier moved to London.
From a British newspaper he learnt that Brian Gilbertson, the South African
dealmaker who engineered the $57 billion takeover of BHP
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by Billiton in 2001 to create the world’s largest mining group, had fallen out
with the merged leadership.

So Agarwal made a cold call, just like that: “I always take a chance. I told
Gilbertson that I would like him to help me list my company.” In turn,
Gilbertson asked about his hobbies, and Agarwal recollects, “I told him that my
hobbies are whatever the other man wants. Gilbertson said, ‘I do cycling.’ I
replied, ‘I do cycling too’.” The pair biked 60 km from Oxford to London, with
Agarwal trailing. Agarwal reflects, “Some strength helped me cover that
distance. Gilbertson came to India, checked out all our assets and was impressed.
I offered him a good package and he became Chairman.” Vedanta subsequently
attracted others on the board—P. Chidambaram, the late Sir David Gore-Booth
and Michael Fowle, Chairman, KPMG—and the company successfully listed on
the London Stock Exchange. With this, Agarwal became a global player in
mining and metals in less than a decade.

When Agarwal came to Mumbai for the first time as a 20-year-old, he

was fascinated by Narendra Desai, Chairman, Apar Group, the doyen of the
aluminum industry at that time. Thirty years later, the two still meet over a cup
of tea every week and share a bond that transcends business. Agarwal says, “He
is a follower of the Hare Krishna movement. From him I learnt that you can be
an industrialist and also be a bhakt.”

In 1993, Ranjit Pandit, now Managing Director, General Atlantic, had

just moved back to Mumbai from New York, to open McKinsey and Co.’s India
practice, which he chaired. In inimitable Agarwal style, Pandit got a call out of
the blue, with Agarwal describing Sterlite as a small company which had a lot to
learn. From then on, Pandit has been a regular sounding board. He says: “Look
at the power generation company he’s going to list. It has just 1,000MW, but
he’s growing it to 10,000MW, and his valuation is based on that”.
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The person who has perhaps most influenced Agarwal’s recent thinking is
an American, Steve Elbaum, Chairman, Superior Cables, inspired Agarwal’s
2006 $1 billion pledge to set up the Vedanta University, a world-class university,
on a 3,200 ha site in Orissa. Says Agarwal: “I want to spend 20% of my time on
philanthropy, building lasting institutions the way American industrialists have
done. That’s my passion now”. His critics say the real motivation is Vedanta’s
interests in Orissa, which holds the world’s fourth largest bauxite deposits—the
mining of these has been opposed by some environmentalists and tribals,
resulting in Norway’s Government Pension Fund divesting its small holding in
Vedanta.

5. AZIM PREMJI - WIPRO

Achievements: Azim Premji has several achievements to his credit. In

2000, the Asia week magazine voted Premji among the 20 most powerful men in
the world. He was among the 50 richest people in the world from 2001 to 2003
as listed by Forbes. In April 2004, Time magazine rated him among the 100
most influential people in the world. In 2005, the Indian Government honoured
Azim Premji with the Padma Bhushan. Chairman of Wipro Technologies; one of
the richest Indians for the past several years; his success story is a source of
inspiration to a number of budding entrepreneurs.

He was studying Electrical Engineering from Stanford University, USA,

when due to sudden demise of his father he was called upon to handle the family
business. He took over the reins of family business in 1966 at the age of 21
years.

At the first general meeting of the company attended by Azim Premji, a

shareholder doubted Premji’s ability to handle business at such a young age and
publicly advised him to sell his shareholding and give to a more mature
management. This spurred him and made him all the more determined to make
Wipro a success story. And the rest is history. When Azim Premji occupied
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the hot seat, Wipro dealt with in hydrogenated cooking fats and later diversified
into bakery fats, ethnic ingredient based toiletries, hair care soaps, baby
toiletries, lighting products and hydraulic cylinders. Thereafter Premji made a
focused shift from soaps to software. Under his leadership Wipro has
metamorphosed from a Rs.70 million company in hydrogenated cooking fats to a
pioneer in providing integrated business, technology and process solutions on a
global delivery platform. Today, Wipro Technologies is the largest independent
R&D service provider in the world. Under his leadership, the fledgling US$ 2
million hydrogenated cooking fat company has grown to a US$1.76 billion IT
Services organization serving customers across the globe. In the past two years
Wipro has also become the largest BPO services provider, based in India.
Wipro’s growth continues be driven by its core values.

Wipro was the first Indian Company to embrace Six Sigma, the first
Software Services Company in the world to achieve SEI CMM Level 5 and it
also became the world’s first organization to achieve PCMM Level 5 (People
Capability Maturity Model). Premji equates Quality with Integrity – both being
non-negotiable.

In the year 2001, Premji established Azim Premji Foundation, a not-for-

profit organization with a vision of significantly contributing to quality universal
education to build a just, equitable and humane society. This means every child
receiving quality education. Although one of the richest Indians, he flies
economy class and is happiest when hiking, reading or discussing the foundation
he has set up to promote primary education.

“Excellence endures and sustains. It goes beyond motivation into the

realms of inspiration. Excellence can be as strong a uniting force as solid vision.
What is excellence? It is an unending great journey all about going a little
beyond what we expect from ourselves. I have found that excellence is not so
much a battle you fight with others, but a battle you fight with yourself,
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by constantly raising the bar and stretching yourself and your team”, Azim
Premji.

HOW DOES ONE CREATE EXCELLENCE IN AN ORGANIZATION?

First, we create an obsession with excellence. We must dream and think

of excellence not only with our mind but also with our heart and soul. Let us
look outside, at the global standards of excellence in quality, cost and delivery
and let us not rest until we surpass them.

Second, we need to build a collective self-confidence, because excellence

requires tremendous faith in one's ability to do more and in a better way. Unless,
we believe we can do better, we cannot.

Third, we must understand the difference between perfection for its own
sake and excellence. Time is of essence. Excellence is about doing the best we
can and speed lies in doing it quickly. These two concepts are not opposed to
each other; in fact, speed and timeliness are important elements of quality and
excellence.

Fourth, we must realise that we cannot be the best in everything we do.

We have to define what our own core competencies are and what we can
outsource to other leaders. Headaches shared are headaches divided.

Fifth, we must create processes like Six Sigma, CMM or ISO that enable
excellence. Use them because they are based on distilled wisdom and it is
imperative that we use the most modern tools to keep processes updated.

Sixth, we must create a culture of teaming (Quality). Cross-functional

teams that are customer facing can cut through an amazing amount of
bureaucracy, personal empire building and silos and deliver savings that spreads
to the rest of the organization and teaming becomes a way of life.
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Seventh, invest in excellence for the future. Future always seems to be at

a distance. But it comes upon you so suddenly that it catches you by surprise, if
not shock. We must certainly trim our discretionary expenses, but must ensure
that our investments in strategic areas lead to excellence are protected.

Finally, excellence requires humility. This is especially needed when we

feel we have reached the peak of excellence and there is nothing further we can
do. We need an open mind to look at things in a different way and allow new
inputs to come in. The great man then shared some tips for success:

• Have the courage to think big; never compromise on fundamental values;

• Build up self-confidence, always look ahead and have the best around you;

• Have an obsessive commitment to quality; play to win; and

• Leave the rest to the force beyond.

6. BHAI MOHAN SINGH - RANBAXY LABORATORIES LIMITED

Bhai Mohan Singh, founder of pharmaceutical giant Ranbaxy

Laboratories, can be called as the doyen of pharmaceutical industry in India.
Bhai Mohan Singh was born in 1917 in Rawalpindi district. Bhai Mohan Singh
began his business career in the construction business during the Second World
War. He started business as a moneylender. Ranbaxy was started by his cousins
Ranjit Singh and Gurbax Singh. Ranbaxy’s name was a fusion of Ranjit and
Gurbax’s names. When Ranbaxy defaulted on a loan, Bhai Mohan Singh bought
the company on August 1, 1952, for Rs.2.5 lakhs.

Bhai Mohan Singh collaborated with Italian pharma company Lapetit Spa
and later on bought it. He made his mark in the pharmaceuticals industry in the
late 1960s when he launched his first superbrand, Calmpose, which was
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an imitation of Roche’s valium. He established an R&D facility at Mohali and

launched one blockbuster pill after the other, such as Roscillin, Cifran, etc.

Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd went public in 1973. Bhai Mohan Singh also
co-founded Max India with his youngest son, Analjit Singh. As a pioneer of
India's pharmaceuticals industry, 89-year-old Bhai Mohan Singh was the
survivor of many a courtroom and boardroom battles, be it to regain hold over
the company or to claim rights to products and patents.

Bhai Mohan Singh died on March 27, 2006. He was the ex-Vice
President of the New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC). For his
contribution in civic matters he was awarded the Padma Shri. For his
contribution to the industrial development of Punjab, the Punjab Government
named an industrial township near Ropar after him.

7. BRIJMOHAN LAL MUNJAL - THE HERO GROUP

Achievements: Chairman of Hero Group; honoured with Ernst & Young

Entrepreneur of the Year in 2001. Today, the Hero Group is the largest
manufacturer of two-wheelers in the world and B.M.Munjal is the man credited
with its success.

His journey began in 1944 at the age of 20. He along with his three
brothers moved from his birthplace Kamalia in Pakistan to Amritsar. The
brothers started supplying components to the local bicycle business. After
partition in 1947, the family was forced to move to Ludhiana. In 1952, Munjals
made a shift from supplying to manufacturing. They started manufacturing
handlebars, front forks and chains. In 1956, the Punjab state government
announced the issue of 12 new industrial licenses to make bicycles in Ludhiana.
The Munjal brothers cashed on this opportunity. Soon Hero Cycles started
giving well established players such as Raleigh, Hind Cycles and Atlas
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Cycles a run for their money. The Hero Cycle was comparatively cheaper and
was sturdy and reliable. It gave the customers value for their money.

In 1984, Japan’s Honda, the largest manufacturer of motorcycles elicited

interest in collaborating with the Hero Group to manufacture motorcycles in
India. Even after the collaboration has broken, the Hero Group is the largest
manufacturer of motorcycles in the world.

SEEDING A DREAM

The founder and patriarch of the $ 2.8 billion Hero Group is a classic first
generation entrepreneur. He is a man who started small, dreamt big and used a
combination of grit and perseverance to create one of the country's largest
corporate groups and the World's No.1 two wheeler company.

BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS

When Brijmohan and his brothers started out, there was no concept of
organized dealer networks. Companies just produced, and most dealers
functioned like traders. Brijmohan changed the rules of the business by trusting
his gut instincts; introducing business norms that were ahead of their time, and
by investing in strategic relationships. "Thanks to the relationships that we have
nurtured so passionately in the Hero Family, the younger generations of some of
our bicycle dealers have become dealers of Hero Honda. These relationships
have survived through generations - through bad times and good times'' the
patriarch now reminiscences.

STAYING AHEAD

In the 1980s, when all two-wheeler companies in India opted for two-
stroke engine technology, Brijmohan preferred a four-stoke engine - a
technology that dramatically increased fuel efficiency and reduced
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maintenance costs. This technology was one of the biggest reasons for Hero
Honda's stupendous success.

A CORPORATE CITIZEN

The Ludhiana Stock Exchange owes its existence to Brijmohan's vision as

does the Ludhiana Flying Club. He has also set up the not-for-profit Dayanand
Medical College and Hospital - an institute now rated as one of the best medical
colleges in India, in terms of infrastructure, quality of staff and alumni profile.

By 1971, the Munjals had set up a rim-making division for Hero Cycles
and launched another company called Highway Cycles that would make
freewheels -- it was then that Brijmohan Lal restructured and streamlined Hero’s
rapidly expanding business. Within a span of 6-7 years, production at the Hero
Cycles plant doubled and in 1975 it became the largest manufacturer of bicycles
in India.

He worked on two premises; first that all four brothers, the original four
brothers, had an equal stake in all the Munjal companies. The second premise
was that any Munjal who wanted to work, had to have a business to run. Now
what did that mean? That meant that between the 1980s, 1990s and 2000, the
business began to expand and to diversify -- they went into textile spinning, they
went into financial services . . . although not all of these succeeded.

They had also integrated vertically right up to a cold-rolling steel mill.

But the biggest and the most important factor in all this was their continuous
growth in the auto components' segment, and this would become perhaps the
Munjal's key competitive strength.

Brijmohan Munjal is steady in his dedication towards his work. With the
widespread network of 5,000 dealers across the country, the Hero Group today is
a conglomerate with an annual turnover of Rs.10,000 crore. Highs and
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lows, rewards and backlashes have all been a part of the Hero Group's corporate
story, but downfalls did not discourage them, nor did losses kill their spirit of
entrepreneurship.

8. CHETAN MAINI: REVA ELECTRIC CAR

Chetan Maini began building toy cars and planes when he was eight.
And, with some nifty workmanship, he has turned his hobby into an innovative
business. He serves as Chief of Technology & Strategy Officer and Deputy
Chairman of Mahindra REVA Electric Vehicle Co Ltd. (alternative name is
REVA Electric Car Company Private Ltd.), a joint venture between Maini
Group of Bangalore and AEV LLC, USA. Mr. Maini has over 14 years
experience with electric vehicles during the course of which he has developed
over 6 electric, solar and hybrid-electric vehicles in India and US. At Stanford,
he served as the project leader.

In this regard, Chetan Kumar Maini, the former owner of Reva Electric
Cars is a lucky man to have built a remote-controlled toy car at the age of 8, and
won a school prize in the sixth standard. Later, he started building toy planes and
go-carts with a scooter engine. As a mechanical engineering student, he built
solar and hybrid cars. And, finally, he designed and built a battery-operated car -
India's first electric car, the Reva. He just takes three weeks to put together a
model. Today, Maini picks up most of his ready-to-assemble kits from shops in
Bangalore for Rs.6, 000 to 12,000 apiece.

His childhood fascination for cars led him to pursue a mechanical

engineering degree from the University of Michigan. Maini's fascination for
hybrid vehicles really took off during his postgraduate days at Stanford. He
spent a lot of time researching green technologies and companies that were
working in that space.
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"In my college days, we were four friends who were working on a solar
car together. We were always looking at starting a company, especially in the
electric vehicles space," he says. That is how he ended up working for a
company called Amerigon, which was working on the electric vehicle
technology. And that is where the idea of Reva was born.

When Maini introduced Reva in India in 2001, the auto market looked at
his electric car with amusement, some even indulged him by taking test rides,
but few took the car seriously. In late-2006, the company received an investment
of $20 million from Draper Fisher Jurveston and Global Environment Fund to
help Reva's strategic growth globally.

9. DEEPAK PAREKH – HDFC

He is a Chartered Accountant. Mr. Parekh is a Fellow of the Institute of

Chartered Accountants (England & Wales). He is designated as Chartered
Financial Accountant from England and Wales. Mr. Parekh received a Bachelor
of Economics of Bombay University and holds a Financial Chartered
Accountant degree from England and Wales.

Mr. Parekh joined Housing Development Finance Corporation in a senior

management position in 1978 and served as its Managing Director from 1985 to
1993. He is an eminent banker and a renowned financial expert in the country.
He served as the unofficial Crisis Consultant to the Government of India. He
began his career with Ernst & Young Management Consultancy Services in New
York.

HDFC has reached where it is today because of sheer hard work and
shared vision.

Mr. Parekh was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 2006 for his contribution
in the field of trade and industry. On January 24, 2008, Mr. Parekh was awarded
the lifetime achievement award by Finance Asia for his
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contribution towards the banking/financial sector in Asia in 2003. He was also

the first recipient of the Qimpro platinum award for Quality for his contributions
to the services sector and the youngest recipient of the prestigious corporate
award for lifetime achievement from the Economic Times. He has won several
other awards including 'Hall of Fame' award by Outlook Money Magazine in
2005 and Best Non Executive Director award by the Asian Centre for Corporate
Governance in 2006.

10. DHIRUBHAI AMBANI – RELIANCE GROUP

Achievements: Dhiru Bhai Ambani built India’s largest private sector

company. He created an equity cult in the Indian capital market. Reliance is the
first Indian company to feature in Forbes 500 list.

Dhirubhai Ambani was the most enterprising Indian entrepreneur. His life
journey is reminiscent of the rags to riches story. Dhirajlal Hirachand Ambani
was born in 1932, at Chorwad, Gujarat, into a Modh family. His father was a
school teacher. Ambani started his entrepreneurial career selling “bhajias” to
pilgrims in Mount Girnar over the weekends.

After doing his matriculation at the age of 16, Ambani moved to Aden,
Yemen. He worked there as a gas-station attendant, and as a clerk in an oil
company. He returned to India in 1958 with Rs.50, 000 and set up a textile
trading company. Assisted by his two sons, Mukesh and Anil, Dhirubhai built
India’s largest private sector company, Reliance India Limited, from scratch.
Over time his business has diversified into a core specialization in
petrochemicals with additional interests in telecommunications, information
technology, energy, power, retail, textiles, infrastructure services, capital
markets and logistics.

Dhirubhai revolutionized capital markets. From nothing, he generated

billions of rupees in wealth for those ho put their trust in his companies. His
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efforts helped create an ‘equity cult’ in the Indian capital market. With
innovative instruments like the convertible debenture, Reliance quickly became
a favourite of the stock market in the 1980s.

In 1992, Reliance became the first Indian company to raise money in

global markets, its high credit taking in international markets limited only by
India’s sovereign rating. Reliance also became the first Indian company to
feature in Forbes 500 list. Dhirubhai Ambani was named the Indian entrepreneur
th
of the 20 century by the Federation of Indian Camber of Commerce and
Industry. A poll conducted by the Times of India in 2000 voted him ‘greatest
creator of wealth in the century’.

He is the man behind Reliance Industries, whose empire extends from

petrochemicals to textiles. With his vision and astute leadership, Ambani has
succeeded in established Reliance as one of the largest private sector company in
India. Dhirubhai Ambani has received global adulation for his success. In a
recent poll conducted by Asia week, he was selected as one of the 5 most
powerful people in Asia. He has been profiled by Times of India in their section-
Indian of the Century. He was awarded the Wharton School Daan’s medal for
his contribution as a leader to international business, world economy and
political policy.

11. EKTA KAPOOR - BALAJI TELEFILMS

Achievements: Creative Director of Balaji Telefilms; awarded with Ernst

& Young Start up Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2001. Ekta Kapoor can be
aptly called the reigning queen of Indian television industry. The serials
produced by her company are a great hit with the masses and are dominating all
the major T.V. channels.

Ekta is the daughter of former Bollywood superstar Jeetendra and sister

of the current Bollywood hero Tusshar Kapoor. Ekta did her schooling from
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Bombay Scottish School and later on joined Mithibai College. She was not
interested in academics and on the advice of her father ventured into TV serial
production at the age of 19. Her company has produced more than 25 serials and
each one is being shown, on an average, four times a week on different channels.
Ekta Kapoor’s serials have captured the imagination of the masses. She has
broken all previous records of TV serial production and popularity in India.

Ekta Kapoor has produced and co-produced numerous soap operas,

television series and movies. Today, Ekta Kapoor dominates Indian television,
producing more than eight television soaps for STAR Plus, India's leading
general entertainment channel.

She has traversed a long way, pushing through a host of odds that have
stood her way since her first musical game show Dhum Dhamaka went on air
around 1994.

The self-confessed control freak has moved on to making films, though

the factor continues in her life, stronger than ever. From the small screen to the
big, she still courts controversy with the way she deals with some of the subjects
in her serials; she still hires and fires people.

Though her dreams appeared to shatter as her creative products flopped

on the small screen, her confidence in herself and her belief in the Almighty saw
her pulling off success with a hilarious comedy show "Hum Paanch". After that
there has been no looking back for this young wizard of Indian television.

Today, Balaji is no more a private limited enterprise but a public limited

company. And no prizes for guessing how much sweat, toil and labour the
largest and youngest single producer of television software in the history of
India's entertainment industry has put in.
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Despite the popularity of her soaps, Ekta has received a lot of criticism
for her controversial and bold scenes, the portrayal of female characters, false
sophisticated sets and repetitive, frivolous plots. In the short span of her career
this young entrepreneur of India has achieved many awards and civic honours.
She was chosen to lead the Confederation of Indian Industries' (CII)
entertainment committee. Truly, it is not Ekta Kapoor alone for the bull's eye
success of Balaji Telefilms, rather there is a strong team of more than 300
professionals who are sincerely working behind the scenes and so the familiarity
must have gone to the company and its team and not Ekta alone.

12. GALLA RAMACHANDRA NAIDU – AMARARAJA BATTERIES

Dr. Ramachandra Naidu Galla born in1938 is an Indian industrialist, the

founder of the Amara Raja Group of companies. He is married to Aruna Kumari
Galla, a minister in the Andhra Pradesh state government.

CAREER

Galla was born in the village of Petamitta in Chitoor District, Andhra

Pradesh. He did his bachelors in Electrical Engineering at Jawaharlal Nehru
University in Anantapur, then took a masters degree at the Regional Engineering
College, Rourkela and a second masters degree at Michigan State University.
After leaving Michigan, he worked for US Steel, and then as a consulting
engineer on the design of power plants.

He returned to India in the 1980s, when he founded Amara Raja Batteries

in Chitoor; the group spun off a number of subsidiaries, including Galla Foods
and Mangal Precision Products. The group currently has an annual turnover of
Rs.1900 crore.

Dr. Ramachandra N. Galla is the patriarch of an illustrious business

family of Andhra Pradesh, Gallas, who have established a name for themselves
by successfully setting up Amara Raja Batteries. Dr. Galla started his career as
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an Electrical Engineer in US Steel Corporation, USA moved on to Sargent &

Lundy, USA as a Consulting Engineer for the Designing of Nuclear & Coal
Fired Power Plant. He initiated various projects in these corporations & mastered
the ropes of this competitive business in a very short time. However, he soon
discovered that his natural inclination was serving his country and as a logical
sequel he gravitated towards Chittoor his native place in India. Dr. Galla laid the
foundation of Amara Raja batteries in 1985 in Chittoor.

Dr. Galla's finest hour as a businessman came in 1998 when he was

presented Best Entrepreneur of the Year 1998 ” – by Hyderabad Management
Association, Hyderabad. He has been bestowed with honorary doctorate degrees
from Jawaharlal Nehru Technical University in 2008 at Hyderabad & Sri
Venkateswara University in 2007 at Tirupati. He has also been conferred with
“The Spirit of Excellence” award by Academy of Fine Arts, Tirupati, and
various other prestigious awards.

He is passionate about a corporate’s responsibility to society as well as

championing eco-friendly business practices. Dr. Galla has established various
charitable trusts. He is dedicated to rural development and improving the
economic conditions of the farmers in Chittoor District, Andhra Pradesh.

13. GAUTAM ADANI - ADANI GROUP

Gautam Adani born in 1962 is the Chairman of the Adani Group, a

leading trading and export company of India. In September, 2010 Forbes
magazine announced that Adani is the 6th richest person in India with a personal
wealth of US $10 billion as of March, 2011. He is the first billionaire from the
city of Ahmedabad.

Gautam Adani was born in Ahmedabad, India, to Shantilal and Shantaben

Adani in a Gujarati Jain family. He set out for Mumbai to make a living with
only a few hundred rupees at the age of 18. He studied at the Seth
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C. N. Vidyalya School in Ahmedabad and later on at Gujarat University. Adani

is a University dropout; he studied till his second year for a Bachelor's Degree in
Commerce.

He worked in Mumbai as a diamond sorter at Mahindra Bros. After

working there for two years, Adani, 20 at that time, set up his own diamond
brokerage outfit at Zaveri Bazaar and made his first lakh.

In 1981, one year later, his elder brother Mansukhbhai, bought a plastics
unit in Ahmedabad and asked Gautam to run it. This marked the beginning of
Adani's foray into global trading by beginning to import polyvinyl chloride
(PVC), a key raw material for manufacturing plastics. After the economic
liberalization, the import duty on various goods was slashed, and profits of
Adani Exports, then his flagship company, grew immensely.

In the first half of the 1990s, the American multinational Cargill and the
small Indian company Adani Group joined hands for a project to produce and
export salt from Gujarat. The Americans exited the proposed partnership citing
management and control differences, leaving the Indian partner with 5,000 acres
of land for which it had no use. Gautam Adani could have been in trouble. But
he saw there an opportunity. Call it prescience, providence or a good gamble. In
place of the captive jetty to export the salt, now stands Mundra Port, India’s
largest private port. The surrounding land is home to the largest multi-product
special economic zone in the country. These crown jewels on the Gujarat
coastline stand testimony to Adani’s business acumen. He started with an
investment of Rs.5 lakh in 1988, and his group’s current turnover is Rs. 7,000
crore.

Adani soon saw an opportunity to import plastic and break the monopoly
of the local manufacturers. Adani Exports Ltd was formed in 1988 as a
partnership firm. The company went public in the mid 1990s, by which time it
had expanded to coal and scrap metal businesses. Says Pranav Adani,
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his nephew and Managing Director of Adani Wilmar: “What separates him from
the rest is that he can see 5-7 years ahead.”

Mundra was the fountainhead of the group’s activity—the locus of all

expansion that followed. After building the port, Adani added backward and
forward links to complete the chain. As the port became active, he realized that
there would be need for power and began importing coal. This was the seed for
his foray into power and energy sector.

The transition of his flagship company, Adani Enterprises, would be more

spectacular. From a trading house with around Rs.22, 000 crore revenue, it is set
to become an infrastructure conglomerate with more than Rs.42, 000 crore
revenue by 2012. “Adani Group can make India and Indian infrastructure
happen,” says Uday Kotak, Vice-Chairman and MD, Kotak Mahindra Bank.

Adani Enterprises is among the top five players in every business it is

into, says a research report by the financial services firm IDFC-SSKI. Currently,
it is the largest trading house in India and the largest private sector player in coal
trading with 20 million tonnes contracts in 2008-09. It is also the largest private
company in power trading. Adani plans to emulate the success in his newer
ventures. He has earmarked investments of over Rs.25, 000 crore over the next
three years. “What people accomplish in 10 years, my father wants to do in
two,” says Karan.

Adani Group’s entry into power generation thus becomes an automatic

extension. It is also the most ambitious. It will determine the group’s fate and its
rise to the top echelons of Indian industry. But Adani has a clear-cut plan. “With
the development of power plants, we will be vertically integrated and drawing
synergistic benefits among the Adani Group companies for capturing value
across the entire chain,” he says.
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Does Adani function purely as an instinctive entrepreneur or is there a

process to his ambition? “Three years ago we were not in the power business.
But when the State Electricity Act gave way to deregulation, we entered the
business,” say Pranav and Karan.

14. GHANSHYAM DAS BIRLA – BIRLA GROUP

Achievement: Laid the foundations of the Birla Empire; founder of the

Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).

Ghanshyam Das Birla is the man who laid the foundation of the Birla
Empire. He was a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi and advised Gandhiji on
economic policies. He was the most important pre-Independence contributor to
the Indian National Congress. He is also popularly known as the builder of Birla
Mandirs.

Born in 1894, G.D. Birla was a native of Pilani. His grandfather Shiv
Narayan Birla was a traditional marwari moneylender. Ghanshyam Das Birla
entered the business arena during the time of First World War. He established a
cotton mill in Sabzi Mandi, and later on established Keshoram Cotton Mills.
Along with cotton mills he diversified to jute business and shifted his base to
Calcutta city in Bengal, the world's largest jute producing region. He established
Birla Jute Mills in Bengal, much to the consternation of established European
merchants.

In 1919, with an investment of Rs.50 lakhs, the Birla Brothers Limited

was formed and a mill was set up in Gwalior. In 1930s, G.D. Birla set up Sugar
and Paper mills. In 1940s, he ventured into the territory of cars and established
Hindustan Motors. After independence, Ghanshyam Das Birla invested in tea
and textiles through a series of acquisitions of erstwhile European companies.
He also expanded and diversified into cement, chemicals, rayon and steel tubes.
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After independence, the Birlas expanded their business and started

production in many fields. Near Mirzapur, he, in collaboration with Caesar, an
American friend, set up an Aluminum Plant Hindalco. Ghanshyam Das Birla
also founded several educational institutions. Birla Institute of Technology and
Sciences (BITS) Pilani has today evolved into one of India’s best engineering
schools. He also established many temples, planetariums, and hospitals.

In 1957, he was awarded India’s second highest civilian honour, the

"Padma Vibhushan" by the Government of India. G.D. Birla award for scientific
Research has been established to encourage scientists for their contribution in
the various fields of scientific research in his honor. The Birla family is one of
the foremost business houses in India. During the decades of 70`s and 80`s, Birla
brothers were among the topmost Industrial Houses of India. Their businesses
vary from petrochemicals and textiles to automobiles and Infocomm.

Ghanshyam Das Birla died in 1983 at the age of 90.

15. GOENKA. R.P. – RPG GROUP

Rama Prasad Goenka MP is the founder and currently Chairman Emeritus

of the RPG Group, one of India's leading industrial houses. With a turnover of
more than Rs.8000 crore last year, the RPG Group's core business activities
include power (CESC, which supplies power to the city of Kolkata); Tyre
(CEAT, a leading Indian tyre company); power transmission (KEC International,
the world's second largest EPC power transmission company), retailing
(Spencer's, India's largest organized retail chain), entertainment (Saregama India,
India's oldest music company) and technology (which embraces life sciences and
IT).

Born in Kolkata in 1930, Rama Prasad Goenka was educated at the famed
Presidency College, where he came in touch with some outstanding
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teachers of his time and picked up an abiding interest in history and economics.
Soon after his graduation, Rama Prasad Goenka became associated with the
Indian jute industry. At a very young age as Chairman of Indian Jute Mills
Association, he played a leading role in underscoring the need for modernizing
the traditional industries.

The RPG Group was set up in 1980 with jute, cable and carbon black,
with a turnover of Rs.70 crore. He, found time to have a stint at Harvard
University and later took pioneering steps to invite the renowned IMD at
Lausanne to India and set up the International Management Institute in Delhi,
where he continues as Chairman. Rama Prasad Goenka is a former Chairman of
the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) and
Chairman of the Confederation of Asia Pacific Chambers of Commerce &
Industry, where he continues as a Member of the Advisory Board.

Currently a Rajya Sabha member of the Parliament, R.P. Goenka is

deeply involved in social work. He is a Trustee of the Jawaharlal Nehru
Memorial Fund and a Trustee of the Indira Gandhi Memorial Trust. He is also a
trustee of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation. Rama Prasad Goenka has taken abiding
interest in education, particularly higher education and served as Chairman of
Board of Governors of this Institute for two terms, during which IIT Kharagpur
was rated the country's No. 1 engineering education institute by India Today.

During his colourful business career spanning more than five decades,
Rama Prasad Goenka served many public institutions. He is a former Director of
the Central Board of Reserve Bank of India, General Insurance Company of
India, Steel Authority of India and Industrial Development Bank of India.

In recognition of his unique services, the Emperor of Japan bestowed on

him his country's highest honour for a Foreigner "The Order of the Sacred
Treasure Gold and Silver Star". The Institute of Advanced Studies in Education
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Deemed University (IASE), Rajasthan has already honoured him with a D. Litt
(Honoris Causa) for his contribution to industry and his deep involvement in
social work.

16. JEYSINGH THOMAS - AVT GROUP

Born at Idayankudi near Tirunelveli, Mr. Jeysingh Thomas did his

graduation in the MCC and a post graduation in business in UK. He established
the first commercial plant tissue culture lab in India in 1984. He remained a role
model for budding entrepreneurs in agriculture.

DIVERSE BUSINESSES

Mr. Thomas became the Chairman of AV Thomas group in 1968 after his
father’s demise. Established in 1925, the group is involved in diverse businesses
including tea, coffee, rubber, spices, leather goods, food ingredients and natural
extracts, medical appliances, treated rubber wood, shipping and warehousing,
agency services and plant technology. He employs more than 11, 000 people.

Habib Hussain, one of the executives on the board of A.V. Thomas

Group, said Mr. Jeysingh Thomas had a sharp business mind. He made friends
for life and kept his word.

17. JINDAL, O.P. - JINDAL GROUP

Shri Om Prakash Jindal more popularly known as O.P. Jindal was born in
1930 to a farmer late Netram Jindal of village Nalwa of district Hisar in
Haryana. Since his childhood the young Jindal had interest in technical work. He
started his industrial career with a small bucket-manufacturing unit in Hisar. In
1964, he commissioned a Pipe Unit Jindal India Limited, followed by a large
factory in 1969 under the name Jindal Strips Limited.
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At present, there are twenty factories under the flagship of the Jindal
Organization, which are worth over Rs.17, 500 crores, under whose umbrella,
thousands of families directly or indirectly benefit themselves.

O.P. Jindal was the Chairman of the Jindal Organization. In 2004, Jindal
was conferred the prestigious "Life Time Achievement Award" for his
outstanding contribution to the Indian Steel Industry by the Bengal Chamber of
Commerce & Industry. According to the latest Forbes' List, O.P. Jindal has been
ranked 13th amongst the richest Indians of the country and placed 548th
amongst the richest persons of the world.

His life's mission was to help others particularly the common man in
every possible way. Shri Jindal was known for his unassuming generosity and
donates crores of rupees annually not only to known but also to needy strangers.
Numerous social and religious institution of India also received liberal donations
from Shri Jindal for noble causes.

Jindal's philosophy was that without the upliftment of weaker and

backward sections of society our dream of being a leading nation of the world
shall remain unfulfilled. To realize this conviction he was motivated into
politics. Like industry in politics too, he had a successful story to tell. He
received tremendous support and co-operation of the people and became a
Member of the Haryana Legislative Assembly in 1991. In 1996, he was elected
as a Member of Parliament in the 11th Lok Sabha from the Kurukshetra
Parliamentary Constituency of Haryana with a landslide victory.

The life journey of Jindal from a farmer's son to a successful industrialist,

a philanthropist, a politician and a leader would serve as a great source of
inspiration for generations to come.
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18. JOHN YESUDHAS, V.F. – WAVETEL

Yesudhas began his career as a marketing executive in 1998 with a salary

of Rs.3500. In 2000, he decided to freelance as a dealer. With the money he
made, he started a shop in a tiny 250 sq. ft. space in Plaza Centre, Chennai. Thus
was born Wavetel – in rather humble surroundings.

Today, in a decade, Wavetel is the number one retailer of mobile phones

in South India. At the beginning of 2008, Wavetel had eight branches. Then in
August 2009 – Wavetel had 23 outlets – 22 in Chennai and one in Chengelpet,
near Chennai. Wavetel created two records – the first by clinching the highest
number of phones sold on an opening day at their Valsaravakkam branch, in
Chennai. They sold 367 phones that day, which is a national record. The second
is their exclusive mobile retail shop in Chengelpet. It is the largest individual
telecom store in the country, spread over a space of 3400 sq. ft.

Wavetelmobile.com, the brand’s website is hugely popular among

customers. The website gets an astounding 80, 000 hits a day. Another web-
based initiative by John is wavetelsms.com. It is one of the few websites which
gives customers the option of sending unlimited free sms-es. Today the company
employs approximately 300 people and their turnover has been increasing
steadily. John has ambitious plans for the brand saying, “We are in the process
of talks with foreign investors for equity investment to go national. We are
looking towards having a pan Indian presence.”

John is understandably proud of brand Wavetel – after all, from being a

small player in the market, today it is a brand to contend with in the south.
Wavetel also bagged South India’s Number One Retailer Award for the 2008 -
09 financial year. Riding the crest of success, John and Wavetel are surfing to a
bigger and brighter future.
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19. KALLAM ANJI REDDY - DR REDDY'S LABS

Achievements: Founder Chairman of Dr. Reddy’s Group of Companies,

awarded with the Padmashri in 2001, Dr. K. Anji Reddy is a pioneer in
pharmaceutical research in India. Dr. Reddy served in the PSU Indian Drugs and
Pharmaceuticals Limited from 1969 to 1975. He was the founder-Managing
Director of Uniloids Ltd., from 1976 to 1980 and Standard Organics Ltd., from
1980 to 1984. Dr. Reddy is a serving member of the Prime Minister’s Council on
Trade & Commerce, Government of India, and has been nominated to the Board
of National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research.

Kallam Anji Reddy is an Indian entrepreneur in the pharmaceutical

industry, the founder of Dr Reddy's Labs. He spent his early years in the village
of Tadepalli in Guntur district, Andhra Pradesh, where his father grew turmeric.
Reddy graduated from the local high school and went on to get his first Bachelor
of Science degree from A.C. College at Guntur in 1958. Dr. Reddy holds a
B.Sc.-Tech in Pharmaceuticals and Fine Chemicals from Bombay University
and a Ph.D., in chemical engineering from the National Chemical Laboratory,
Pune.

It was the first company to take up drug discovery research in India. In

2001Dr. Reddy’s Labs became the first Asian pharmaceutical company outside
Japan to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The company has revenues
of $ 546 million is India’s second largest pharmaceutical company.

Dr. Reddy is also a philanthropist. He is the founder-Chairman of Dr.

Reddy’s Foundation for Human & Social Development, a social arm of Dr.
Reddy’s, which acts as a catalyst of change to achieve sustainable development.
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20. KARSANBHAI PATEL – NIRMA

Dr. Karsanbhai Khodidas Patel born in 1945, in Gujarat, is an Indian

industrialist, founder of the Rs.2500 crore Nirma group with major interests in
detergents, soaps and cosmetics. He has interests in education, and founded a
leading engineering college, the Nirma Institute of Technology. He is sometimes
referred to as Dr. K.K. Patel.

LIFE

Born into a farmer family from north Gujarat, Karsanbhai finished his
B.Sc. in Chemistry at age 21 and worked as a lab technician, first in the New
Cotton Mills, Ahmedabad, of the Lalbhai group and then at the Geology and
Mining Department of the state Government. In 1969, Karsanbhai set up Nirma,
(named after daughter Nirupama) selling detergent powder. This was an after-
office business - the one-man company would bicycle through the
neighbourhoods selling handmade detergent packets door to door. At a price of
Rs.3 per kg, (one third the price of leading detergents), it was an instant success.

After three years, Karsanbhai felt confident enough to quit his job. Later
he said: the lack of any such precedent in my family made the venture fraught
with fear of failure. But farmers from North Gujarat are known for their spirit of
enterprise. Karsanbhai set up shop at small workshop in an Ahmedabad suburb.
The Nirma brand quickly established itself in Gujarat and Maharashtra.

The high quality and low price of the detergent made for great value.
Fueled by housewife-friendly advertisement jingles, Nirma revolutionized the
detergent market, creating an entirely new segment for economy detergent
powder. At the time, detergent and soap manufacture was dominated by
multinational corporations with products like Surf by Hindustan Lever, priced
around Rs.13 per kg. Within a decade, Nirma was the largest selling detergent
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in India. Since production was labour intensive, Nirma also became a leading
employer. Made without some phosphates, Nirma was also somewhat more
environment friendly.

After establishing its leadership in economy-priced detergents, Nirma

entered the premium segment, launching toilet soaps Nirma bath and Nirma
beauty soap, and premium detergent Super Nirma detergent. Ventures into
shampoo and toothpaste were not successful, but the edible salt Shudh is doing
well. Nirma beauty soap is one of the leading toilet soaps, behind Lifebuoy and
Lux. Overall Nirma has a 20% market share in soap cakes and about 35% in
detergents. Nirma also has successful operations in neighbouring countries.

In 1995, Karsanbhai started the Nirma Institute of Technology in

Ahmedabad, which grew into a leading engineering college in Gujarat. An
Institute of Management followed, with the entire structure being consolidated
under the Nirma University of Science and Technology in 2003, overseen by the
Nirma Education and Research Foundation. The Nirma labs education project,
aimed at training and incubating entrepreneurs, was launched 2004.

Karsanbhai's two sons and son-in-law are now at leading positions in the
Nirma organization: Rakesh K Patel (MBA) looks after procurement and
logistics, Hiren K Patel, chemical engineer and MBA, heads marketing and
finance, while Kalpesh Patel is in human resources.

AWARDS

In 2001, Karsanbhai was awarded an honorary doctorate by Florida

Atlantic University, recognizing his exceptional entrepreneurial and
philanthropic accomplishments.

In 1990, the Federation of Association of Small Scale Industries of India

(FASII), New Delhi, awarded him the 'Udyog Ratna' award. The Gujarat
Chamber of Commerce felicitated him as an 'Outstanding Industrialist of the
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Eighties'. He has served twice as Chairman of the Development Council for

Oils, Soaps and Detergents.

21. KIRAN MAZUMDAR-SHAW - BIOCON LTD

Achievements: Chairman & Managing Director of Biocon Ltd., India’s

largest biotechnology company. In 2004, she became India’s richest woman.
Kiran Mazumdar was born in Bangalore. She did her schooling at Bishop Cotton
Girls School and Mount Carmel College at Bangalore.

After completing her B.Sc in Zoology from Bangalore University in

1973, she went to Ballarat University in Melbourne, Australia and qualified as
master brewer in 1974. Her professional career kick-started immediately and she
joined Carlton and United Beverages as a trainee brewer. Four years later she
changed tracks to join the Irish company Biocon Bio-chemicals Limited as a
Trainee Manager. Not quite content with being just an employee, the same year
Mazumdar Shaw took the bold step of founding Biocon India in collaboration
with the parent company Biocon Bio-chemicals. In retrospect, calling it a bold
step seems to be an understatement as her capital investment was a paltry Rs.10,
000. Banks were hesitant to give loans to her as biotechnology was a totally new
field at that point of time and she was a woman entrepreneur, which was a rare
phenomenon.

HER DETERMINATION

Her initial operations included developing a process to extract papain, an

enzyme from papaya. This fermentation process made way to develop processes
for many other industrial enzymes. By 1990, Biocon India became proficient
enough to start an in-house research programme, in solid substrate fermentation
technology, which allowed it to produce enzymes from pilot to plant level.
Mazumdar Shaw, however, was not satisfied. The visionary in her saw that
Biocon had potential to enter the field of biopharmaceuticals. She,
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thus, initiated strategic research programs. In 1994, Biocon established Syngene

International Private Limited as a Custom Research Company (CRC) under the
stewardship of Kiran Mazumdar Shaw. In 2000, Biocon established Clinigene,
India's first Clinical Research Organisation (CRO).

Today, Biocon is recognized as India’s pioneering biotech enterprise. In

2004, Biocon came up with an IPO and the issue was over-subscribed by over 30
times. Post-IPO, Kiron Mazumdar held close to 40% of the stock of the
company and was regarded as India’s richest woman with an estimated worth of
Rs.2,100 crore. She is a much sought after biotech pioneer who has been referred
to as "India's Biotech Queen" by The Economist and "India's mother of
invention" by New York Times.

Besides her hectic professional life, Mazumdar Shaw has also penned a
coffee table book titled 'Ale and Arty'. She has made sure that Biocon has an
active corporate social responsibility and is active in the field of public health
and education. She also heads the Vision Group on Biotechnology for the state
of Karnataka and was instrumental in making Bangalore a ‘Biotech Hub’.

WINNER TAKES IT ALL

It is difficult to ignore such achievements, and Mazumdar Shaw’s efforts

have been duly acknowledged. She has been the recipient of several awards over
the years. These include ET Businesswoman of the Year, Best Woman
Entrepreneur, Model Employer, Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year
award for Life Sciences & Health Care in 2002, Leading Exporter, Outstanding
Citizen, Technology Pioneer, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Indian
Chamber of Commerce in 2005, and the Wharton Infosys Business
Transformation Award in 2006. The Government of India conferred her with
Padmashri (1989) and Padma Bhushan (2005). But the award she values the
most is the MV Memorial, one named after the great engineer and visionary Sir
M. Vishweshwariah.
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22. KISHORE BIYANI – PANTALOON

Kishore Biyani is the Chairman of the Company. He is a commerce

graduate with a post-graduate diploma in marketing management. He has over
25 years of experience in the field of manufacturing and retailing of ready-made
garments. Over the years, he has led the emergence of Pantaloons Retail as the
leading retailer in the country. He has received several awards including the
'CEO of the Year - 2001', 'the most Admired Retailer of the Year 2004', the
'Retail Face of the Year - Images Retail Awards 2005' and the 'E&Y
Entrepreneur of the Year Services 2006'.

Pantaloon's Kishore Biyani has become India's largest retailer, but still
has several aces up his John Miller shirtsleeves. And now that he has set himself
the task of retaining control of the largest retail space in the country, he would
not let anyone - suppliers or international promoters included - catch him
slacking.

Unlike most people, Kishore Biyani makes no bones about his simplicity.
He believes in taking quick decisions. The deal with Bennett, Coleman & Co
was done in seven days flat. He has never met V. Banga of Unilever in his life,
and leaves the task of relationship building to his managers. Biyani has not
always played in the big league. Having quit the family business, which supplied
denim to Arvind Mills, in 1987, he collected Rs.7 lakh and set up a small plant
that produced 200 trousers a day.

In the crowded market of ready-mades, Biyani learned his first lesson - to

be heard, you need to shout louder than the rest. As a result, though the turnover
for his Bare brand was only Rs.7 lakh in the first year, he spent Rs.16 lakh
advertising it. He also added John Miller shirts to his portfolio. This year,
Pantaloon will spend Rs.85 crore advertising its various store formats.
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The shift from manufacturing to retail was the critical point in Biyani's
career. Distribution costs were the reason brands were snuffed out in the market,
so Biyani decided to rewrite the rules of the game. In 1993, he experimented
with a small store format, and Pantaloon Shoppe was launched in Panjim, Goa,
"where we could make mistakes without anyone noticing them".

From the shoppe to the large store format in 1998 - this time in Kolkata
("If you can conquer Kolkata, you can conquer other markets too. Calcuttans,
contrary to perception, have money and are loyal customers. They are emotional
people and get emotionally attached to a brand.") - was a carefully crafted plot.
And he was proved right when the Kolkata Pantaloon store became a raging
success and Biyani stepped on to the turf as a super retailer.

Other professionals have wondered where Biyani picked up the tricks of

the retailing trade. Some he learned from his own mistakes, he admits. Others he
picked up from the big boys of international retail. Biyani was not above picking
up the gauntlet and launched Big Bazaar, a hypermarket in Mumbai as a gamble;
financing it mostly through a loan. To India's surprise, the format worked and
the rest is history. He goes personally to people's homes, talks to local
community leaders and spends weeks walking streets of bazaars to get a feel of
what products should be stacked in a new store.

The year 2004-05 has been eventful for Pantaloon Retail as it crossed the
Rs 1,000-crore target. But there have been other watershed years, such as 1997
when it launched its first departmental store, Pantaloons, in Kolkata and 2002,
when it opened its first departmental store, Big Bazaar. Today, Pantaloon is
poised to don a new look with a new corporate identity. From the `Knowledge
Group,' it will be now known as the `Future Group' with a new logo (a human
palm print) with the message `India tomorrow.'

The Rs.1,100-crore retail company has been moving at a scorching pace

straddling almost all possible segments in retail (fashion, food, general
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merchandising, home, leisure, entertainment, finance, beauty, wellness and e-

tailing), exploring new areas and formats. His passion is ‘observing’ and he
enjoys watching Hindi drama and cinema. He is a compulsive reader.

23. KOCHOUSEPH CHITTILAPPILLY -V GUARD

Kochouseph Chittilappilly: “I started my business 30 years back at very

small level with only two workers. At that time when I was working as a
supervisor my ambition was to earn more so I started a small industry. Slowly
and steadily the industry started growing but I believe the main reason was the
quality of products for our growth story.”

Aged 56 years, is a post graduate in Physics from Calicut University. He

started his career as a Supervisor in an electronics company, where he worked
for three years. In the year 1977, he started a SSI Unit engaged in the
manufacturing and selling of electronic voltage stabilizers.

He is one of the founder promoters and has motivated the company to

succeed in its business. He has been the Managing Director of the company
since its inception and has taken the company to its current levels of stature and
recognition with his experience and vision. He is the recipient of numerous
awards, which were bestowed on him for his exemplary performance in
business. Among them are Business Man of the Millennium 2000 from Rashtra
Deepika, Tourism Man of the year from Destination Kerala and Samman Pathra
Award for top income tax payer from Honourable Union Minister of State for
Finance. As the Managing Director, Mr. Kochouseph has been the main driving
force behind the company’s sustained growth. Finding capital was difficult;
banks were not impressed by his proposal, and refused to fund him.
Nevertheless, in 1977 an undeterred Chittilappilly ventured into stabiliser
manufacturing with an investment of one lakh rupees that his father gave him.
With just two employees, all that he could make were two stabilisers a day.
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Today, Chittilappilly is one of the most successful businessmen in Kerala.

His Rs.165-crore V-Guard group is a household name in the state, with its
flagship stabilisers and a host of products such as water pumps, water heaters,
UPS, wiring cables and starters. V-Guard employs more than 4,000 people
directly and indirectly. The group includes V-Star creations, makers of apparel
ranging from designer churidars to lingerie, and the Veega Land amusement
park.

“I believe that the achievements of V-Guard group are not entirely due to
my abilities. I realise that our managers, staff and other associates have played a
major role in bringing V-Guard to this level,” he says. No wonder he has set
apart four percent of the equity for his 700-odd employees.

24. MOHAN SINGH OBEROI - OBEROI GROUP

Achievements: Founder of the Oberoi Group of Hotels; honoured with

the Padma Bhushan in 2001. M.S. Oberoi can be aptly termed as the father of the
Indian hotel industry.

M.S.Oberoi was born in 1898, in the erstwhile undivided Punjab, now in

Pakistan. He did his early schooling in Rawalpindi and completed his graduation
from Lahore. In 1922, to escape the epidemic of plague, he came to Shimla, and
got a job of a front desk clerk at the Cecil hotel at a salary of Rs.50 per month.
He was a quick learner and shouldered many additional responsibilities along
with the job of desk clerk. Hs diligence prompted Mr. Clarke to request Oberoi
to assist him when he acquired Clarke’s hotel, where he gained first hand
experience in all aspects of hotel operations.

In 1934, M.S.Oberoi acquired the Clarke’s Hotel from his mentor, by

mortgaging his wife’s jewellery and all his assets. In 1938, he signed a lease to
takeover operations of the five hundred rooms of Grand Hotel in Calcutta, which
was up for sale following a cholera epidemic. In 1943, M.S.Oberoi
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acquired the controlling interest in the Associated Hotels of India which owned
the Cecil, and Corstophans in Shimla, and the Maidens and the Imperial in
Delhi, and a hotel in Lahore, Murree, Rawalpindi and Peshawar. He thus became
the first Indian to run the largest and the finest hotel chain.

In 1959, the Oberoi group became the first group to start flight catering
operations in India. In 1965, M.S.Oberoi opened the first modern five star
international hotel in the country, the Oberoi Intercontinental, in Delhi. In 1966,
he established the prestigious Oberoi School of Hotel Management, recognized
by the International Hotel Association in Paris. The Oberoi group opened the 35
storey International Sheraton in Mumbai. Oberoi was the first to employ women
in the hospitality sector. Today, the Oberoi group owns or manages 37 luxury
and first class international hotels in seven countries. M.S. Oberoi was elected to
the Rajya Sabha in 1962 and in 1972. He was also elected to the Lok Sabha in
1968.

He was the recipient of many awards and honours. In 1943, he was

conferred the title of Rai Bahadur by the British Government. Other honours
include admission to the Hall of Fame by the American Society of Travel
Agents; Man of the World by the International Hotel Association, New York;
named by Newsweek as one of the “Elite Winners of 1978” and the PHDCCI
Millennium award in 2000. M.S.Oberoi was honoured with the Padma Bhushan
in 2001.

It is not often acknowledged that M.S.Oberoi, Chairman of an empire of 29

hotels spanning most of the world’s landmass is also the man who pioneered
India as a brand, way back when it was only a bazaar of begging bowls and
exotica. At 90, he looked back in something close to awe and said, “I often
wonder how I did it.”

Life served his lemons regularly but with even greater regularity did the
Rai Bahadur make lemonade.
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The story of the Rai Bahadur is all the more impressive because there was
nothing in his background to suggest that he would be able to create the world
class ambience and sophistication for which the group is celebrated now that he
would be able to foresee India’s current positioning in the global market, while
doffing a deferential hat to history when it was demanded.

25. NARAYANA MURTHY, N. R. – INFOSYS

Achievements: One of the founders of Infosys Technologies Ltd., chosen

as the World Entrepreneur of the Year in 2003 by Ernst & Young, Narayana
Murthy is the Non- Executive Chairman and Chief Mentor of Infosys
Technologies Ltd. He is a living legend and an epitome of the fact that honesty,
transparency, and moral integrity are not at variance with business acumen. He
set new standards in corporate governance and morality when he stepped down
as the Executive Chairman of Infosys at the age of 60.

Born in 1946, N.R. Narayana Murthy is B.E. in Electrical Engineering

from the University of Mysore and M. Tech from IIT Kanpur. He began his
career with Patni Computer Systems in Pune. In 1981, he founded Infosys with
six other software professionals. In 1987, Infosys opened its first international
office in USA.

With the liberalization of the Indian economy in 1990s, Infosys grew

rapidly. In 1993, the company came up with its IPO. In 1995, Infosys set up
development centres across cities in India and in 1996 it set up its first office in
Europe in Milton Keynes, UK. In 1999, Infosys became the first company to be
listed on NASDAQ. Today, Infosys has a turn over of more than $2 billion and
has an employee strength of over 50, 000. In 2002, Infosys was rated No.1 in the
Best Employers in India 2002 survey conducted by Hewitt and in the Business
World’s survey of India’s Most Respected Company conducted in the same year.
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He has received many honours and awards. In June 2000, the Asia week
magazine featured him in a list of Asia’s 50 Most Powerful People. In 2001,
Narayana Murthy was named by TIME/CNN as one of the 25 most influential
global executives. He was the first recipient of the Indo-French Forum Medal
and was voted the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2003 by Ernst & Young. The
Economist ranked Narayana Murthy as eighth on the list of the 15 most admired
global leaders (2005) and he also topped the Economic Times Corporate Dossier
list of India’s most powerful CEOs for two consecutive years - 2004 and 2005.

As founder Chairman and CEO of Infosys Technologies, he heads the

country’s successful Silicon Valley- style start up, one that is right at the
forefront of India’s charge on the global software market. With 4800 employees,
11 software development centers in India and 13 overseas offices, Infosys is a
world class act, deriving 97 % of its revenues from exports.

In the past five years Infosys has grown at breath taking speed: sales grew
at a compounded annual rate 74 per cent and profits by 78 per cent, a
performance that puts Infosys way ahead of its peers. It created history by
becoming the first Indian registered company to list on an American stock
exchange-NASDAQ–with an issue of two million American Depository Shares
that raised $ 70 million. Infosys pioneering step has paved the way for other
Indian IT companies.

At Patni Computer Systems (PCS), Mumbai-based company, as head of

software, he recruited six professionals who were to eventually partner him in
his first experiment of creating wealth namely Nilekani, S. Gopalkrishnan,
Ashok Arora, N.S. Raghavan, K. Dinesh and S. Shibulal.

When he mooted the idea of creating a software supplier leveraging

Indian skills and aimed at overseas markets, they readily bought into the
concept. Infosys Consultants was formed in July 1981 with the pooled savings
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of the seven partners of Rs.10, 000/- mostly borrowed from their wives.
Murthy’s HDFC- financed Shivajinagar apartment in Pune was the first
registered office.

A chance encounter on a plane with K.S.N. Murthy of KSIIDC brought

Murthy to Bangalore and within a fortnight Infosys had the money–Rs.52 Lakh
to buy its first computer. According to Murthy, the big breakthrough for Infosys
came with economic liberalization after 1991. The Company’s turnover, a mere
Rs.5 crore then, grew 100 folds since.

26. NARESH GOYAL - JET AIRWAYS

Achievements: Founder Chairman of Jet Airways; recipient of the first

MB Munjal award for Excellence in Learning & Development in the private
sector category in 2006. He also figures in the Forbes list of Indian billionaires.

Naresh Goyal completed his graduation in Commerce in 1967. Goyal

started working in the airline industry right after college in his great uncle's
marketing agency for Lebanese International Airlines. His salary was so low --
$40 per month -- that he had to sleep on the floor of his office. But he moved up
the ranks quickly, becoming a publicist for the airline and from there, moving on
to other international airlines. From 1967 to 1974, he learnt the intricacies of the
travel business through his association with several foreign airlines.

In 1974, Naresh Goyal founded Jet Air Pvt. Ltd., to look after the Sales
and Marketing operations of foreign airlines of India. His mother sold her own
jewelry to give him money to start the business. He was involved in developing
studies of traffic patterns, route structures, and operational economics and flight
scheduling. His rich and varied experience made him an authority in the world of
aviation and travel.
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In 1991, when the government opened the airline industry to private

competition, Goyal jumped at the opportunity. Naresh Goyal took advantage of
the Open Sky Policy of the Government of India and set up Jet Airways for the
operation of scheduled air services in the domestic sector in India. Jet Airways
started commercial operations in 1993. In 2005, Jet Airways came up with an
IPO and it was a huge success.

Today, the net worth of the Jet Airways promoter is over Rs.8, 100 crore,
which makes him the sixth richest Indian as per the Business Standard
Billionaire Club.

Goyal, however, has not forgotten his humble past, a reason why he
remains modest and avoids the limelight. For e.g. minutes after announcing his
decision to buy Air Sahara for Rs.2,225 crore - a deal, which gives him control
over almost half of India's domestic aviation airspace - Goyal refuses to give it
much importance and said, "It's no big deal. I am neither happy nor excited.
Such acquisitions have been the way of life in the west."

The modesty has been interpreted in many ways. While his associates say
it shows that the man has his feet firmly on the ground, others say it's his way of
avoiding controversies. He has been doing precisely that ever since he got into
the civil aviation industry 36 years back. He also has clear ideas about which
way to go. For example, he thinks low cost airlines are just a myth in India.

Along with Jet’s meteorite rise, Naresh Goyal also rose in the
entrepreneurial arena. He has won several honours and accolades. These include
Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Services from Ernst & Young in 2000,
Distinguished Alumni Award-2000 for meritorious and distinguished
performance as an Entrepreneur, Outstanding Asian-Indian award for leadership
and contribution to the global community given by the Indian
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American Centre for Political Awareness, Aerospace Laurels for outstanding

contribution in the field of Commercial Air Transport twice, in 2000 and 2004.

27. DR. PRATAP C REDDY - APOLLO HOSPITAL GROUP

Dr. Pratap C Reddy is a doctor and a businessperson credited with

establishing the first chain of corporate hospitals in India-the Apollo Hospitals
Group. He currently holds the post of Executive Chairman in the group. Dr.
Reddy is a cardiologist with international experience. He worked at the Missouri
State Hospital, U.S.A. where he also had the distinction of heading multiple
research programmes.

Apollo Hospitals is one of the most famous chain based hospitals in

India. It is the largest health care provider in Asia and third largest in the world.
It has hospitals in India, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh and has presence in gulf
countries as well. Dr. Reddy has been successful in attracting the cream of
Indian doctors from developed countries like the US and UK. For his efforts,
Apollo Hospital is recognized as one of the finest in the world – at par with the
hospitals in the First World countries. Initially there were lot of constraints, but
that did not stop Dr. Reddy from pursuing his entrepreneurial dreams. In 1983,
he set up the first centre in Chennai and then it followed by setting up of a
consultancy body, The Indian Hospital Corporation. He then commissioned two
more care centres in India. This set up a trend for other corporate health cares in
India. From then onwards, it was an upswing for the Apollo group. It presently
has over 22 centres in major metros in India and has a combined turn over of 100
million dollars.

He started on his mission for providing quality health care in India in the
eighties. It is believed that he was spurred by his failure to provide critical care
to a patient in the U.S. The patient died as a result. This incident prompted him
to start world-class affordable health care facilities in India.
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Apollo Hospitals proved that Indian doctors are no less than the best in
the world by successfully operating on a complicated cadaver transplant. Having
successfully steered Apollo hospitals in a number of locations through out India,
Dr. Reddy went on to expand operations throughout Asia. His more recent
initiative is to create a virtual Apollo centre, which is available anywhere, at any
time. This is a web based Apollo initiative. He successfully implemented
Telemedicine Technology in India which will be a key enabler in transforming
health care delivery in India.

The Apollo Group opened its first clinic in Dubai in 1999. He also has
plans for SAARC countries. He has plans for opening secondary health centers
in India. His new projects include 'Med-varsity'-a virtual medical university
providing total access to medical experts and 'MEDNET'-a hospital systems
management package. Dr. Reddy has many more dreams like setting up rural
hospitals. He recognized 23 sites in the semi urban areas. He started a clinic in
his native village to serve as a model for similar such projects for the Apollo
group to emulate throughout India. Dr. Reddy was awarded the Padma Bhushan
in 1991.

28. RAMNATH GOENKA - INDIAN EXPRESS GROUP

Ramnath Goenka was born in 1904 in Darbhanga district of Bihar. He

belonged to a Marwari business family. He completed his primary education in
Varanasi. At the age of 15, he came to Chennai to learn the ropes of the business
by venturing into the trade of yarn and jute.

At the age of 22, he was nominated as the member of Madras Legislative

Council by the British Government. He founded the Indian Express in 1936, and
in 1941, he was elected President of the National Newspaper Editors’
Conference.
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In 1948, Daily Tej partnered with Ramnath Goenka to publish Indian

News Chronicle, English daily, from New Delhi. He published several
revolutionary articles in The Indian Express. In 1948 he published an English
daily named Indian News Chronicle along with his friend Lala Deshbandhu
Gupta. Ramnath Goenka merged Indian News Chronicle with The Indian
Express after the death of Lala Deshbandhu Gupta.

During emergency he raised his voice against Indira Gandhi. He was

against the congress till his death. Ramnath Goenka was close to Janatha party
and helped the party in drafting election strategy. Ramnath Goenka died in
Mumbai after prolonged illness in 1991.

29. RAMOJI RAO – RAMOJI CITY

Cherukuri Ramoji Rao, better known as Ramoji Rao, is an Indian

businessman and media entrepreneur. He is head of the Ramoji Group which
owns, among other things, the world's largest film production facility, Ramoji
Film City. Rao Cherukuri was born in Gudivada, Krishna District, Andhra
Pradesh, into an agricultural family. Some of the companies owned by the
Ramoji group include Margadarsi Chit Fund, Eenadu newspaper, ETV, Priya
Foods, Usha Kiron Movies and as mentioned above, the Ramoji Film City near
Hyderabad. He is also the Chairman of Dolphin group of hotels in Andhra
Pradesh.

Spread across 2,000 acres, the Ramoji Film City is the biggest of its kind
in the world. The Film City where you can get ''everything from a pin to an
aeroplane’’ is Ramoji Rao's biggest project till date and is being developed as
the 'Disneyland' of India. He visualizes it as the ''gateway of tourism in India''.
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30. RANGANATHAN, C. K. - CAVINKARE

C K Ranganathan, Chairman and Managing Director of CavinKare, has

shown the world it is possible to beat the multinationals even in the most
difficult market of fast moving consumer goods. Ranganathan's journey, which
started from a small town of Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu, has been an amazing
one. A business which he started with only with Rs.15, 000 is now worth Rs.500
crore. He learnt the first entrepreneurial lessons from his father, Chinni
Krishnan, who started a small-scale pharmaceutical packaging unit, before
moving on to manufacture pharmaceutical products and cosmetics.

HIS FATHER, HIS INSPIRATION

His father, Chinni Krishnan, an agriculturist, was also into

pharmaceutical business. When he was in the fifth standard, he had a lot of pets
- more than 500 pigeons, a lot of fish and a large variety of birds. He used to
earn pocket money out of pet business at that time. Perhaps, the entrepreneurial
spirit in him showed its first streak.

THE ORIGIN OF THE CONCEPT OF SACHETS

His father had come out with the sachet concept, when he entered college,
a couple of years prior to his father’s demise. He felt liquid can be packed in
sachets as well. When talcum powder was only in tin containers, he was the one
who sold it in 100 gm, 50 gm and 20 gm packs. When Epsom salt came in 100
gm packets, his father brought out salt sachets of as low as 5 gm.

'Whatever I make, I want the coolies and the rickshaw-pullers to use. I

want to make my products affordable to them,' he used to say. Selling things in
sachets was his motto as he said, 'this is going to be the product of the future.'
But his father could not market the concept well. He moved from one
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innovation to another but never thought of marketing strategies. He was a great

innovator, but a poor marketer.

JOINING THE FAMILY BUSINESS

After his father's death, his brothers took charge of the family business. In
1982, when he joined them after his studies, they had launched Velvette
Shampoo. Within eight to nine months, Ranganathan left the business because
his ideas clashed with theirs. As he was in the manufacturing unit, he did not
know anything about marketing or finance but, his inferiority complex
notwithstanding, he was somehow confident of doing business better.

STARTING HIS OWN BUSINESS WITH RS.15, 000

For a week, Ranganathan could not make up his mind as to what business
to do. He knew only two things; making shampoo and rearing pets. He did not
want to venture into the shampoo business as it would initiate a fight with his
brothers. However, he decided to do the same later as he could only make
shampoo.

He rented a house-cum-office for Rs.250 a month against an advance of

Rs.1, 000. He took another place for the factory for a rent of Rs.300 a month and
against an advance of Rs.1, 200. He bought a shampoo-packing machine for
Rs.3, 000.

HOW CHIK SHAMPOO WAS BORN

Ranganathan named it Chik Shampoo after his father. The product did not
succeed immediately; he learnt many things during the process. In the first
month, he could sell 20,000 sachets and from the second year, started making
profits. He moved to Chennai in 1989 but his manufacturing unit continued to be
in Cuddalore. It took him three years to get the first loan because banks asked for
collateral. But one particular bank gave him a loan of
 130

Rs.25,000 which he rotated and later upgraded to Rs.400,000, Rs.15 lakh and so
on.

“You know what the bank manager wrote in our loan application? This
person does not have any collateral to offer but there is something interesting
about this SSI unit. Unlike others, this company pays income tax. I must say my
business never looked back because I was very particular about paying income
tax”, he says.

STRATEGIES THAT MADE CHIK SHAMPOO NO. 1 IN SOUTH

INDIA

When Chik entered the market, Velvette Shampoo was being marketed
aggressively by Godrej. But a scheme of his became extremely successful -- he
exchanged five sachets of any shampoo for a Chik Shampoo sachet, free. Later,
he altered the scheme -- he started giving one free Chik Shampoo sachet in lieu
of five Chik Shampoo sachets only. Soon, consumers started asking for Chik
sachets only. The sales went up from Rs.35, 000 to Rs.12 lakh a month.

When he introduced jasmine and rose fragrances, his sales went up to

Rs.30 lakh per month and with actor Amala as the model, his sales rose to Re.1
crore a month. Each idea of his was rewarded by his customers. His market share
increased and in 1992, he became the numero uno in South India. It took nine
years for him to overtake my brothers' business.

HOW CHIK SHAMPOO CONQUERED THE RURAL MARKET

Multinational companies sold products in big bottles and not in sachets

and they sold only from fancy stores. They did not look at the small kirana
stores, nor did they look at the rural market. Ranganathan went to rural areas of
South India where people hardly used shampoo. He showed them how to use it
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through a live demonstration on a young boy. He asked the assembled to feel

and smell his hair.

Next he planned Chik Shampoo-sponsored shows of Rajnikanth's films.

He showed advertisements in between, followed by live demonstrations. He also
distributed free sachets among the audience after these shows. This worked
wonders in rural Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. After every show, His
shampoo sales went up three to four times. Today, the Indian rural market is
growing at a pace double than that of the urban market.

LAUNCHING MEERA HERBAL POWDER

He continued with Chik Shampoo for seven years before venturing into
anything else. Meera Herbal powder was actually not his idea. Shaw Wallace
already had a herbal product but it was marketed very poorly. He felt there was a
demand for herbal products and he made a good product. In the third month
itself, he topped the market. In six months, he had 95 per cent market share,
while Shaw Wallace had only 4-5 per cent.

HOW BEAUTY COSMETICS BECAME CAVINKARE

As he planned to expand to new products, he thought the name Beauty

Cosmetics would be restrictive. In 1998, he ran a contest among his employees
for a name and one of them suggested CavinKare; with C and K spelt in capitals.
C K, his father's initials. Cavin in Tamil means beauty and grace.

PERFUMES FOR THE POOR

He wanted to cater to those who cannot afford (high priced) perfumes.

Good perfumes came at a huge price -- they were beyond the means of ordinary
people. He decided to come out with a Rs.10 pack Spinz. He was successful in
that too.
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Ranganathan has great admiration for those who fight against all odds
and attain success. C. K. Ranganathan, is a successful entrepreneur and venture
philanthropist. He has set an ambitious sales target of Rs.5, 000 crore by 2012.

31. RAO, G.M. - GMR GROUP

G M Rao, a mechanical engineer, is the founder Chairman of GMR

Group-global Infrastructure major. The Group is well diversified and
professionally managed with focus on business verticals of Airports, Energy,
Highways and Urban Infrastructure including SEZs, apart from interests in Agri-
business.

Born in 1950 in a small town of Rajam in the Srikakulam district of

Andhra Pradesh, G M Rao established the GMR business empire starting from a
single jute mill in Rajam in 1978. Within a decade, he successfully established
three green field power plants in the country, one each in the state of Tamil
Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Under his guidance, the Group is now
developing several power projects in various parts of the country and is
expanding its activities to other countries.

G M Rao expanded the Group’s presence in the infrastructure sector by

leading the Group’s foray into highways. The Group has already completed two
greenfield road projects and four more projects are nearing completion.

G M Rao has today successfully established GMR Group, as one of the

leading infrastructure organisations in the country. Rao was the largest
shareholder in the country’s leading 75-year-old private sector Vysya Bank,
which has been successfully transformed into a modern technology driven and
hugely successful financial enterprise. For his visionary approach and
outstanding contribution to ING Vysya Bank for a period of two decades as its
Director and Chairman, the Bank in September 2006 conferred on him the status
and title of ‘Chairman Emeritus’.
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He was chosen as the ‘Entrepreneur of the year’ at the Economic Times

Awards for Corporate Excellence 2006 – 07. The award has been given to him in
recognition of his exemplary entrepreneurial spirit and potential in breaking into
the big league of top infrastructure organisations in India. He has also been
awarded the ‘Most Promising Entrant to the Big League’ by CNBC TV18 at its
‘Indian Business Leader Awards 2007’.

While a set of seven core values define the GMR Group’s distinct
organization culture, Rao has also spearheaded a “Family Constitution” model
for the group. In line with this, over a period of time, the members of the family
would provide only the strategic inputs and investment needs and counselling for
all the businesses and activities of the Group.

“Most of the people had no idea how to deal with that sudden turn of
events. But GMR decided to take advantage of a new growth area – the power
sector – and soon acquired the licence for a power project in Tamil Nadu, the
Basin Bridge power plant in Chennai, which became the first to be developed by
the group,” says BVN Rao, a long time friend and now chairman of the energy
vertical.

GMR, who cut his entrepreneurial teeth with a jute yarn facility in Rajam,
went on to display his talent in sugar and other agri-businesses, ferro-alloys, IT
and banking before he finally decided to zero in on infrastructure. Setting up a
jute yarn facility taught him a great deal about teamwork and taking his fellow
workers along. His banking experience is what he treasures the most. “Turning
around non-performing assets and building confidence among customers after a
total change in the top management was not easy. We were dealing with public
money,” he says.

GMR, unlike most family-run businesses, has also put in place a

succession plan in the form of a family constitution, which has been revealed to
shareholders as well, to ensure transparency in operations. On criticism
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about the family’s role in his companies, GMR has a confident answer: “It’s run
by family professionals. Almost 70% of the listed companies on BSE are family-
run businesses anyway.”

But even at 61, GMR, has merely written the preface of his
entrepreneurship story, it seems. He is now poised to enter the big league and if
early indications are anything to go by, getting awards too could become a habit.

32. RAUNAQ SINGH - APOLLO TYRES

Raunaq Singh, a first generation entrepreneur, in his leisure time would

often recount his days after partition and how he built his business empire from
scratch. He along with 13 others had to camp in a single room in Delhi’s Gole
market after partition. A job in a spice shop, Munilal Bajaj & Co, did help him to
somehow survive but could not contain his entrepreneurial instinct.

Born in1922, at Daska in Pakistan, Raunaq Singh learnt the elementary

lessons of business skills while being employed as a salesman of a steel pipes
merchant in Lahore earning Rs.8 a month — a princely amount in those times.
The seeds of entrepreneurship were planted when Raunaq Singh cashed in on an
opportunity thrown up by the dearth of water pipes in the areas around Lahore.
The profits he, thus, earned were ploughed back in the form of setting up his
own business in steel pipes.

Having sold his wife’s jewellery for about Rs.8, 000 in Old Delhi’s
Chandni Chowk in November 1947, Singh went to Calcutta to try his luck.
Singh set up his office at 85, Netaji Subhash Road; first to start spice trade but
later founded Bharat Steel Pipes. The rise of Raunaq Singh is considered in the
corporate world as a rags-to-riches story. He related his pre-independence
enterprise to his friends, in Lahore, how he sold old pipes to a customer for
double its price that too by getting an advance from him. His trademanship
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could be seen in procuring water pipes without investing a single rupee. His first
deal of Rs.1, 000 was the beginning of his fortune in steel pipe trade.

Like any other Indian living in what became Pakistan post-independence,

Singh also faced the brunt. But his resilience helped in re-building an enterprise.
Says Mr. Harish Bhasin, Chairman HB group, “from selling tubes he dreamt of a
tube factory and made it possible. Even when Apollo Tyres was taken over by
the government, he fought tooth and nail and later he was reinstated in the
company.” His corporate friends give credit to his political connections.

His organizational skills could be seen in shaping three apex associations,

FICCI, Assocham and FIEO, the only person to do so. CII president Ashok
Soota remembers him as “a first generation entrepreneur committed to the
industry association movement in India.”

FICCI recalls Singh’s tenure as president during 1989-90 as year of

transformation for both the Indian economy as well as for the organization. Even
during the early years of economic liberalization when India Inc was
apprehensive of the globalization process, Raunaq Singh commented in his
President’s report: “India of the 90s is ready to face the challenges of change”.

His business rival Mr. Hari Shankar Singhania Chairman, JK Industries,

says: “As a person he was very amiable, full of wit and humour and he would
put many a serious matter into simple earthy language sorting out...

RAUNAQ SINGH, THE CHARISMATIC FIRST GENERATION

ENTREPRENEUR

The noted industrialist, Raunaq Singh, who died at the age of 79 presided
over a business empire with a turnover of about Rs.2, 700 crores. A doyen of the
post-partition era of industry, he rose rapidly from being a mere trader to a
corporate giant with his flagship company Apollo Tyres.
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The Apollo group of companies now includes Bharat Gears, Raunaq

International, Raunaq Automotive Components and Menarini Raunaq Pharma
and has over 9,000 employees.

Mr. Raunaq Singh laid the foundation of his tyre manufacturing empire
about 40 years ago and set the stage for India to become a major tyre producer.
As a doyen of the business community in northern India as well as due to his
expertise in the automotive sector, the Government decided to appoint him as the
first Chairman of Maruti Limited. He has also held senior positions in the Exim
Bank, Export Credit Guarantee Corporation and the Indo-German Consultative
Group.

The CII President, Ashok Soota, said with Mr. Singh's passing away, the
country had lost an eminent and charismatic first generation entrepreneur. Mr.
Raunaq Singh represented the first group of post-partition businessmen in the
country. Hailing from an ordinary background and starting as a steel trader, he
went on to establish a group with a turnover of over $525 million.

Raunaq Singh was a powerful figure in corporate India. He was the

former President of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and
Industry, the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India, the
PHDCCI, and numerous other trade bodies.

Raunaq Singh’s corporate journey from Lahore to New Delhi, first as a

steel tube merchant, then as a steel tubes manufacturer and finally as the founder
of Apollo Tyres, has been the stuff of corporate folklore.

33. SABEER BHATIA - HOTMAIL

Bhatia intended to get his engineering degree and go home to work. His
mother was a bank manager, and his father, Chief Administrative Officer at
Defense Research Organization. Bhatia grew up, like most Indian kids,
presuming that starting a company is impossible unless you are a superman.
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As a graduate student at Stanford University, Bhatia was drawn to

meetings where he heard entrepreneurs like Sun Microsystems’s Scott McNealy
and Apple’s Steve Wozniak. Bhatia’s impression was that they really were fairly
ordinary intelligent guys. When he graduated, he took a job as a hardware
engineer at Apple Computer. Soon he started attending cocktail parties of a
group of Indian born entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, where he met many
successful older Indian men. And again they seemed like such ordinary guys.

Bhatia needed $300, 000 to create a working version of the e-mail

programme. He shopped around his business plan and another for a Net-based
personal database to 19 venture capitalists – with no success. Then he met Steve
Jurvetson of Draper Fisher. Jurvetson who was interested but skeptical of
Bhatia’s revenue estimates and dismissed the projections outright, but Bhatia
insisted, “You do not believe we are going to do that?” for their $300, 000
upfront, the firm wanted a 30 percent stake. Bhatia offered 15 percent.
Negotiations seemed to be going nowhere. The next day Jurvetson agreed 15
percent.

Bhatia and his colleague Smith quit their jobs at Apple Computer and
opened a tiny office in Fremont, California. By June, they were running out of
money, but the product would be ready to launch in a month. Another venture
capitalist, Dough Carlisle, was interested in investing, but Bhatia knew that if he
and Smith launched the service first, they would keep more control of the
company they created. He convinced a bank to loan them $100, 000.

In 1996, Bhatia and Smith launched their company, called Hotmail. The
morning of the launch, Bhatia and Smith wore hip beepers, programmed to flash
every hour with the number of new subscribers. The first users found Hotmail all
by themselves, then e-mailed their friends: a hundred users in the first hour, 200
the next hour, 250 in the third. By the time Sabeer went back to
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Doug Carlisle to say in effect okay. Hotmail had 100, 000 subscribers and a
valuation of $18 million.

Hotmail began to deliver news and other internet content into the e-mail
boxes of its subscribers. This was nothing new, but the way the money flowed
was. The sites supplying the content took the position. “Hey, if you want our
news for free, then you would better pay us.” But Bhatia wanted the sites to pay
Hotmail for the privilege of having its content run. Surprisingly, the businesses
agreed to these terms, and soon Hotmail was growing so fast that some content
providers could not handle the traffic that came in from Hotmail. Every morning,
he scoured the internet for signs of competition. It was six months before the
first appeared.

He had always been concerned that Hotmail could be copied. Microsoft

came biding to buy Hotmail in 1997. Six company executives flew down and
offered Bhatia a figure that would have put tens of millions of dollars in his
pocket. He rejected it; a week later they were back, and every week thereafter for
two months. They asked Bhatia to go over and talk to Bill Gates. After a tough
bargain the deal was stuck worth a walloping $400m. Bhatia remained the
company’s top executive after it became a subdivision of Microsoft’s Web
Essentials. By then Hotmail had 144 employees.

So, is Bhatia lucky or is he great? He refuses to give the credit to

anything other than the culture of the Valley itself: Where two 27 year guys get
$300, 000 from men they had just met. Two 27 year old guys who had no
experience with consumer products, never started a company, never managed
anybody, no experience even in software. All they had was the idea.

In 1999, Sabeer Bhatia quietly left Microsoft to begin a new venture

called Arzoo.com, a web site that brings information technology experts and
corporations together to solve technology related problems on the internet. His
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goal is to create the world’s largest network of human intellectual capital on the
web.

34. SARATH BABU – FOOD KING

Humble beginnings seldom pay. But Sarath Babu will not buy that. For
this young entrepreneur, rags-to-riches is not just another adage. It is his very
first foundation of success. From a slum in Chennai to the top echelons of
academia with an enrolment in chemical engineering at BITS Pilani and IIM-A,
and now as the steward of his Food King Catering business, Sarath has come a
long way. His humility perhaps made him reject several high-brow offers from
MNCs after his MBA. That, in a way, was the genesis of Food King Catering -
with paltry Rs.2, 000 seed money.

Today, his food business spans six locations with a Rs.9-crore turnover to
boot and set to clock Rs.20 crore by year-end. For Sarath, his mother, who once
sold idlis on the pavements of Chennai and worked as an ayah, is a pillar of
strength. “Her sacrifice eggs me on,” says Sarath. Apart from bringing up four
children, Sarath’s mother worked as a cook for the mid-day meal scheme for 11
years and got paid just a rupee each day.

Having completed SSLC, she moved on to teach under the same scheme
for five years. Even then, her salary was insufficient. So Sarath’s mom sought
refuge in the food business to supplement her meager income. As she rolled
dough in the form of idlis, dosas, bhajjis and appams, it was Sarath’s job to sell
them in the neighbourhood. “For kids living in a slum, idlis for breakfast is
something very special,” says Sarath even to this day.

A natural entrant to the food business with acquired acumen in childhood,

Sarath has trained his sight higher. From the current 250 people, he’s aiming to
recruit 2,000 people by next year, and probably, 5,000 in the next two years.
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Sarath Babu said, "When I was in my third year at BITS, I organized an

event. My friends thought my management skills were very good and suggested
that I pursue a course in management."

His firm, Food King catering services, was inaugurated at Ahmedabad by

IIM-A Chairman and Chief Mentor of Infosys N.R. Narayanamurthy. Sarath is
all set for a brilliant innings.

Jumping-in to kick start a business right after college should have been
tough. But this bold mindset & compulsion came from his childhood perils.

Initially, his catering business, with two units in Ahmedabad, was Rs.2,
000-per -day in the red. “But I burnt the midnight oil literally to get a solution,”
Sarath says. It’s worth a mention here that Sarath spent most of his childhood in
the dark, without electricity. He focused on volumes rather than spartan servings,
and started taking contracts from institutions and companies.

To bag an order, Sarath even slept on the platform of Mumbai’s railway

station. “That’s one of my finest nights I’ve ever had,” Sarath reminisces. Today,
Food King is targeting 100 clients, including 50 top institutions and 50
corporates for the snacks business — South Indian, North Indian and Chinese
food.

He now envisions Food King’s Palace (food malls) across cities where all
kinds of Indian food would be served at “economical rates”. Is he really worried
about inflation or price-rise in food products? When most of the restaurants have
increased their prices, Sarath sees an opportunity to serve at a cheaper price.
“Sourcing from one place makes a lot of difference. I will tap this opportunity,”
says Sarath. Today, he drives a Chevrolet to take his mother for a ride to oversee
his business units in Chennai. “Next, I want to build a house for my mother,”
says Sarath.
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35. SATHISH BABU, D. – UNIVERCELL

From selling vacuum cleaners as a door to door salesman owning a

business selling mobile telephone sets is quite an impressive advance for a
young man. D. Sathish Babu not only made that transition a decade ago, but he
has firmly established himself as arguably the foremost multi location vendor of
mobile telephones of all sizes and brands in India within a decade of launching
himself in business.

The tag-line of the company he runs reads UniverCell, the Mobile Expert.
Anybody who has every shopped for a mobile phone in this part of the world
known this is no empty boast. Sathish Babu, a mathematics graduate, began his
career as a sales executive with Eureka Forbes where he steadily rose to the post
of regional sales manager during nine year tenure. He left the company in 1997
to start his own business venture, bitten by the bug to be “my own boss”.

It was still the early days of the Indian mobile phone retailing. The
industry was highly fragmented and disorganized. Mobile handsets were
expensive, the grey market dominated and there were few showrooms around to
showcase mobile products.

Sathish Babu entered this scene selling postpaid mobile connections as a

Skycell Teleshop. He soon decided he would provide a nice ambience in which
his customers would be able to choose the cell phone instruments they liked in
comfort and served well by intelligent, courteous, efficient salespersons.

Using his savings and some capital from the family, Sathish started
UniverCell in 2000 in Chennai. Since then, Sathish and UniverCell have spun a
success story to be the largest mobile phone retailer and among the better known
brands in India. Statistics are available to show that one out of every
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three handsets sold in the market is from UniverCell. Its customer base stands at
a vast 5 million, with 100,000 people buying its handsets every month.

From a single store with 32 employees in 2000, UniverCell has grown to

170 stores with over 1350 employees across southern India. The company
continues to be recognized as the top retailer by all major mobile manufactures
and enjoys the best of concessions and incentives.

Sathish Babu has promoted the brand through every available mass media
tool of advertising. Innovative marketing and a consistent presence across media
have been the hallmark of Univercell’s journey as far. Celebrity endorsement is
for instance a big part of its advertising campaigns with film actor R. Madhavan
as its brand ambassador. With effective advertising campaigns and market
promotion, Sathish Babu has made sure that UniverCell is well entrenched in the
hearts and minds of the buying public all over India. The presence of large retail
outlets, print, television, event promotions, billboards and FM radio broadcast,
are constant reminders to customers existing and prospective keeping in line
with the focus of aggressive expansion, UniverCell has started SIS (Shop in
Shop) model stress within Music World of RPG group.

UniverCell has the distinction of being the first mobile phone retailer to
provide a warranty on every purchase, keeping in mind the stiff competition the
grey market poses. Recently UniverCell launched an exclusive Mobile Theft and
Damage Insurance along with Oriental Insurance Co. Ltd. to cover all risks not
covered under the manufacturer’s warranty. It was also the first mobile retailer
to implement the touch and feel concept, besides offering several exchange
offers.

Determined to take UniverCell and mobile phone retailing to the heights

of excellence, Sathish constantly looks to incorporate innovative modern
retailing concepts into his own organization. The series of core improvements
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initiated five years ago has now resulted in a world-class retailing organization
that is powered as much by technology as by its people. The foundation for
growth well in place, UniverCell has its sights on replicating its success Pan
India. These same investments in technology and processes have earned
UniverCell the ISO 9000-2001 certification for quality management systems.

Strong relationships with all the manufacturers, the e-portal @

www.univercell.in and wap.univercell.in, its pan Indian presence, UniverCell
has been able to leverage efficiencies of scale, providing the highest levels of
service and options to consumers. UniverCell presenting a single face to its
customers assures the same level of support (warranties, service, etc) from every
single outlet across the country.

THE ENTREPRENEUR

Sathish and UniverCell have been cresting the wave of the Indian mobile
revolution from the retailing front, growing and evolving to become India's
largest mobile retailer and one of India's best known brands.

Sathish Babu is determined to go places. They are all set of move into the
next phase of expansion. With the Indian cell phone market still quite away from
reaching saturation, Univercell’s future looks bright.

36. SEEMA KAKKAR –REMANIKA

STARTING YEARS

“In 1993, I designed my first label called Rudraksh for Ensemble-Tarun

Tahiliani’s retail chain of stores. It was haute couture for elite class. I got very
encouraging response but fashion was still at a very nascent stage in India-even
rich people of South Mumbai, especially women, were not open to trendy
clothes those days. I use to regularly interact with people on the streets and
realized that youth in suburban pockets such as Bandra and Lokhandwala were
 144

open to experiment with their clothes but they did not have choices at affordable
prices as designers in India were into haute couture and catering to high profile
individual clients. There was a need gap in the market. That is how seeds of
Remanika were sown. In 1994, I rented out a 100sq ft space in Kemps Corner in
South Mumbai and opened the first Remanika store selling ‘Go-sexy’- trendy
youth wear and club wear for women”, says Seema.

THE INITIAL YEARS

“When I started in 1994, I could not even afford shelves and hangers, and
all the clothes used to be displayed on the floor. I paid rent in the evening on a
daily basis from money generated through day sales. One fine day, with barely
few months into the business, I got notice to vacate the store. The following one
year was very stressful. There were times when I had to sell clothes on staircases
and loft of the mall. I had to sell my car and house to stay put in the business.
After some time I rented another 600 sq ft of space on a different floor in the
same premises. Thankfully, clients repaid my faith and business grew steadily’
she says.

TURNING POINTS

The first store was opened in 1994 and then the opening of second store
in 1999. In 2000, she started retailing the products through Pantaloon, and later
from Shoppers Stop, K-Lifestyle, and Pyramid stores. She has now 10 self-
owned stores and retails her products through 80 other outlets. The employee
strength is 400 and has grown 100% over the years.

37. SHAHNAZ HUSAIN - SHAHNAZ HUSAIN HERBALS

There are perhaps few others who can stand testimony to the truth of
these words, as Shahnaz Husain, India’s pioneer in herbal cosmetics.
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Credited with single-handedly placing Indian herbals on the world

cosmetic map, her success story-that of young girl from a conservative Muslim
family who rose to become an international trailblazer in the field of herbals- is
by now history.

President of CIDESCO, the first Asian to enter Selfridges in London and

break a 40 year old sales record, GQM Commitment to Quality award, FICCI’s
outstanding woman entrepreneur, US magazine Success’s World’s Greatest
Women Entrepreneur – the list of accolades and achievements is endless.

An entrepreneur in the truest spirit of the word, the lady has a whopping
80 percent of the domestic herbal market, and sales counters in the best stores
internationally, be it the Seibu chain in Japan, Bloomingdales in the US, Galeries
Lafayette in Paris, Harrods and Selfridges in London … it goes on.

“Though I was married at a very young age, I always knew that I was
made for something more,” begins Shahnaz.

Not prepared to sit back as a housewife and mother the age of 16, the
young Shahnaz set about writing for magazine to earn money so that she could
fund her education. Staying with husband Nasir in Tehran, Shahnaz found the
ideal opportunity in the international beauty schools there. After studying
cosmetic chemistry in international beauty schools in certain centres including
London, Paris and Denmark for close to eight years, Husain hit upon the idea of
exploring the 4000 year old Indian ayurvedic system, so that she could research
and develop herbal cures and treatments.

“I had seen the debilitating effect of synthetic cosmetics abroad; there

was no doubt in my mind that the herbal system would work,” recalls Shahnaz.
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She returned to India to set up shop in one room, with a start up

investment of Rs.35, 000, she borrowed from her father. The going was tough –
Shahnaz had priced her product well above the existing market.

“I began with just one product – Shalife, a massage cream. My facial

were priced at Rs.100, while you get one the market for a paltry Rs.6,”
reminisces Husain. However, that did not stop the crowds from coming in, and
soon, Shahnaz had more clients she could handle.

“I would go to a place for one day, offer free prescriptions and advice,
inaugurate the salon, and go back,” says Shahnaz. It worked – today, there are
more than 600m salons in India and abroad.

The Shahnaz group of companies has acquired a global presence, with

exports to 132 countries including those in the Middle East, South East Asia,
Australia and all over Europe. Recently, the company has been approved by a
Fortune 500 investment company to explore business opportunities.

The strategy was one she applied with great success internationally as
well – at one point, during a makeup demonstration in Russia, Shahnaz was
asked to stop as the floor was caving in under the pressure of the people who had
turned up to watch. Interestingly, Shahnaz has never advertised her products, a
fact that had Harvard in the US wanting to use her marketing system as a case
study.

17 herbal lines, with many more in R&D, Husain is busy expanding her
empire by adding health resorts, signature garments, accessory lines and more to
her portfolio.

38. SHAMIT KHEMKA- SYNAPSE INDIA: the entrepreneur, leader and

achiever

They say, “You must first be a believer, if you want to be an achiever.”

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Shamit Khemka owns one of India’s leading software and web

development outsourcing companies, Synapse Communications Pvt. Ltd. and
Sampatti.com, the much popular online real estate service. He has already
bagged numerous national and international recognitions for being an emerging
young entrepreneur.

He is a man who has proud credentials of being the one to gift India its
first Bulletin Board System with e-mail services. He is also the one to establish
country’s first online real estate database that allows every property buyer and
seeker to enroll their needs and specialties - all for free.

THE FLIGHT… TOWARDS A GOAL SET HIGH

From a computer whiz-kid to become a CEO of a tremendously

progressive MNC, the journey Shamit took was interspersed with challenges.
Just as it is always in ready abundance for the one who has set to move ahead.

While Synapse Communications has grown 10 times (both revenue and

manpower-wise) since its inception in 2002, Sampatti.com, Shamit’s another
creation, has garnered rave reviews from real estate industry specialists and
allied service providers alike for its techno-innovative and effective service
delivery model.

From a standard 30-men company, today, Synapse boasts of over 300

employees - spread in different specialty areas. It ably caters to diversified
business specialties via the arms by the names of Synapse India, Synapse web
solutions, Synapse interactive etc. While its Noida office exemplifies the best of
a state of-the-art infrastructural facility, an upcoming specialty centre at NEPZ,
Greater Noida, is expected to feature futuristic readiness towards taming every
challenge from emerging technological needs.
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SHAMIT – THE MAN OF HIS MEN

Shamit Khemka, the entrepreneur, like all of his successful counterparts,

knows the role of employees in an organization. Talk to any of his employees.
You would immediately get to know hundreds of pro-employee rules and
regulations that they enjoy being in Synapse. Understandably, a job opportunity
in Synapse attracts more applicants in comparison to what a similar offer from
others in the same business promises of.

ON COURSE TO MORE…

In a scenario when in the name of better profits, private sector companies

implement innovative rules to sap employees to the extent of no return; Mr.
Shamit Khemka too implements innovativeness.

He applies it to install a prized balance between business growth and

employee satisfaction. Be it with Synapse India, Synapseco, or any other
extensions of Shamit Khemka’s services to an increasing list of global clients, he
marches on ahead while setting newest standard of professional commitment. On
the course of scaling newer heights with his people, Shamit proves his taste for
integrity by practising a professional culture where individual growth
complements to organizational growth.

BORN LEADER

Someone said, ‘A leader is born, not made.’ May be it is his business

background that has helped him to develop essentials for leading a team of
people and motivate them to work for a common cause.
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SMART THINKER

If his love for information technology and internet inspired him to venture in the
world of IT services at a meagre age of twenty, his ability to smartly handle a
situation is largely responsible for his success today.

39. SHASHI RUIA – ESSAR GROUP

Shashi Ruia is one of India’s foremost entrepreneur industrialists. He is

the co-founder and Chairman of the Essar Group, an organization that in less
than four decades became among the top five Indian companies in each of its six
core businesses.

The Essar Group is a diversified business corporation with a balanced

portfolio of assets in the manufacturing and services sectors of Steel, Energy,
Power, Communications, Shipping Ports & Logistics, Construction and Mining
& Minerals.

When Nand Kishore passed away in 1969, the responsibility of growing

his fledgling business fell on his two sons. Shashi Ruia and brother Ravi
established Essar, a company whose first major project was to build a
breakwater at Chennai port. Over the next four decades, Essar became the Essar
Group. Essar employs more than 50,000 people across offices in Asia, Africa,
Europe and the Americas.

Ably supported by his brother Shashi Ruia led the company into
businesses, like shipping, marine construction, steel, power, telecom, offshore
engineering and oil exploration, which were at one point dominated by
multinationals and public sector units. The brothers, who share a very strong
bond as well as the same office, seized on every available opportunity and
helped Essar pioneer many firsts in Indian corporate history. Essar, for instance,
was the first company to set up a sponge iron plant in the west coast
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of India, the first independent power producer and among the first to introduce
mobile telephony services.

Essar draws strength from the integrated nature of its various businesses
and their collective synergies. Shashi Ruia has been the driving force behind this
integration strategy. Widely regarded as one of the architects of modern India,
he has a passion for education and mentoring young talent. He considers all
employees of Essar a part of his extended family.

Ruia said he himself was 'not an MBA but only an MBB (Marwari by
birth),' but he imbibed the spirit of enterprise from his father who took him along
wherever he went to start a business. The lessons he learnt as an understudy to
his father were productive and helped in building the Essar Group which now
has a strong presence in steel, petrochemicals, telecom, engineering and
construction, he added.

Ruia said that young graduates could draw inspiration from great
entrepreneurs like Dhirbubhai Ambani and Ratan Tata. He said India has the
potential to grow stronger and that it was true China was far ahead especially in
the fields of steel, cement and automobiles.

Collecting jewels of wisdom all along his professional carrier, which

spans in decades, Ruia worked in almost all sectors of business. In fact, Ruia has
not only masterminded the group's business strategy but has also consolidated a
whole range of activities through backward and forward integration. And the
reach of the Group can be gauged from the fact that Essar Steel Ltd, the flagship
company of the Group, encompassed businesses in the area of ports, harbours,
submarine, oil and gas pipelines and installations, modifications and
maintenance of offshore oil field platforms, super deep land drilling rigs and
submarine gas pipeline.
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With total assets of more than $5 billion, and annual revenues of more
than $2.2 billion, Essar Group has become one of India's leading and most
diversified private sector conglomerates.

The Group, under the watchful eyes of Ruia has been able to utilize the
synergy and propel its growth into a large business conglomerate. In fact, after
the successful completion of its multi-crore construction project of Sardar
Sarovar Nigam Ltd (SSNL), Essar is now working on a project for the state
government-owned Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation Limited (GSPCL) for
its gas pipeline project. And with Ruia as the guiding star, even scaling sky will
not be a difficult feat for the Essar.

It's no wonder that the Essar Groups under the leadership of Shashi and
his brother Ravi Ruia who is a Vice-Chairman of the company, was ranked 37th
in the list of billionaires in the country.

40. SHIV NADAR - HCL

Shiv Nadar has been the only entrepreneur in the last decade, apart from
Azim Premji of Wipro, to successfully manage hardware business and software
ventures. In fact Nadar has successfully straddled the entire spectrum of
Information technology: from hardware, software and services, to training.

The HCL Empire, which spawns from Japan in the east to US in the west,
was conceived in a garage in Noida near New Delhi when Nadar quit his job
with DCM and, armed with Rs.1.5lakh, started making and selling calculators in
1976. His big break came when he ventured into the hardware business.

Armed with a degree in Electrical Engineering in 1967, he started work

as a systems analyst at Cooper Engineering and within a year moved out to
DCM as a senior management trainee. The next seven years of his life were
spent uneventfully as he climbed up the ladder and started Data Products
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Division. He was heading until he quit in 1975 and laid the foundation of HCL
group from an attic in Noida.

PREDICTED THE COMPUTER BOOM

People laughed at him when he predicted the future for Information

Technology in the country and the scope it provided to HCL. His understanding
was that sooner or later when the time comes, HCL could cash on the computer
boom in the country. He proved them wrong and had the last laugh as within a
short span of three years HCL was able to develop India’s first micro processor
based commercial computer, HCL-8c.

By this time the HCL team was able to gather in-house expertise for
developing the hardware, controllers, languages, systems software utilities and
even application software for its computers. Finally with the technology jump in
the next four years 8c became a museum piece, HCL was able to step in with an
advanced version, also developed in-house. This symbolized the galloping pace
of changes in the international market and HCL’s nascent efforts to move along.

Since 1993, he has stopped running companies and confines himself to

once-a-quarter meeting with CEOs. He now heads the group apex body of HCL
Corporation, whose charter is to set standards and create policies in areas such as
new business opportunities, financial and accounting practices, HRD and
corporate communications.

41. SINGH, K.P. – DLF GROUP

Kushal Pal Singh, with a net worth of $35 billion, is the fourth richest
Indian in the world. He heads the DLF Group, India's largest real estate
developer, which has interests in Delhi, Chandigarh, Kolkata, etc.
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In 1960, Singh quit the Indian Army to join the American Universal
Electric Company, a joint venture between Universal Electric Company of
Owosso, Michigan, and Singh's family. Later he established Willard India
Limited along with a Philadelphian company ESB Inc. He joined DLF Universal
Limited as the Managing Director in 1979. Singh's greatest achievement is that
he transformed Gurgaon, a barren village then, into one of the favourite real
estate destinations of India. Today he presides over closely held DLF Group,
India's largest real estate developer with an estimated land bank of 3,000 acres in
prime city locations. Singh, who owns 99.5% of parent DLF Universal with his
family, is worth, at least $5 billion.

His showpiece: a busy, 10-mile-wide township called DLF City in

Gurgaon, situated south of Delhi, in the neighboring state of Haryana. Some just
refer to it as the "new city" or Delhi's tech city. It is a sight to behold. A barren
expanse of farmland has been transformed into a sprawl of office and residential
towers, interspersed with bright, busy malls, monuments to the country's new
found consumerism.

DLF City boasts restaurants, hospitals, schools, hotels and an 18-hole

Arnold Palmer signature golf course. Gurgaon is no longer the back of beyond
but a suburb much sought after by those who cannot afford Delhi's prices or
would rather live closer to where they work. By laying a modern foundation in a
country whose physical plants usually lag its intellectual assets, Singh put
Gurgaon on the map as a destination for global companies. They have flocked
there to situate their Indian headquarters or back offices. If Bangalore is India's
software services capital, Gurgaon is the call center hub. DLF has 100 million
square feet under development in residential, commercial and retail projects all
over the country.
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Pramod Bhasin, President and Chief Executive of leading outsourcing

firm Genpact, calls DLF Corporate Park, the first office tower Singh built in
Gurgaon, "the birthplace of India's business- process outsourcing industry."

Despite these odds, Bhasin never regretted moving. "We got the kind of
space, both in size and quality that just was not available in the center of Delhi.
DLF really understands what companies like ours need. They are quick, and they
deliver on their word," says Bhasin. Once GE took the plunge, DLF landed other
big-name corporate tenants, including Nestle, PepsiCo, British Airways,
American Express, IBM and Ericsson.

At a time when the industry practice was to sell and not lease, DLF
offered long-term leases, which suited companies that did not want to load assets
on their books. DLF benefited from the steady rentals during a market downturn
when property sales stagnated. Singh's refusal to cut quality corners ensured that
DLF could get premium prices for its properties.

Singh's introduction to GE's legendary CEO Welch came in 1989, when

the company was still scoping out India. Singh set up a meeting with then Prime
Minister Rajiv Gandhi. Welch's book Jack: Straight from the Gut recalls that
Singh also led him to Azim Premji as GE was looking for a partner for its
medical systems business. Today Premji, by virtue of his building software
power Wipro is one of Asia's richest men.

In an interview Welch recalls, "K.P. was the igniter of the flame for GE
coming to India. He was the perfect ambassador because he opened our eyes to a
great country, and we fell in love with it."

The patriarch scrambled to enter the car battery and electrical motors
field, assigning K.P. Singh to make it work. Young Singh found a mentor in
George Hoddy, founder of Universal Electric in Michigan, a joint-venture
partner. Hoddy, recalls, "K.P. was not afraid to work hard. He followed
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directions very carefully and mastered manufacturing." But the diversification

strategy came a cropper in the Indian market.

Regrouping again, Singh and his father-in-law recommitted themselves to

real estate, vowing to break the state's stranglehold by all lawful means. Over 15
years Singh assembled the Gurgaon holdings, starting with 40 acres that his
father-in-law still held. The surrounding families had an average landholding of
4 to 5 acres, with half a dozen relatives sharing the title. To win their trust, he
attended weddings, mediated family disputes, helped out during illnesses.

Singh's leap of faith in Gurgaon paid off in spades. The average cost of
the 3,000 acres that DLF initially amassed in Gurgaon was $2,000 an acre--a
tiny fraction of today's market value.

"Gurgaon was deserted when K.P. first took me there to see it 25 years
ago. But he had the gumption to go relentlessly after it," says Deepak Parekh,
Chairman of home mortgage company HDFC, which started lending to DLF
early in its expansion drive. Along the way Singh insisted his buyers also be on
the up-and-up. Real estate in India is full of off-the-books transactions, the better
for tax dodges and to avoid once-prohibitive mortgage terms. Also, builders
flout codes and often see their handiwork ripped down.

42. SUBHASH CHANDRA GOYAL - ZEE TV

Achievements: Subhash Chandra is the founder of Zee TV, India’s first

private TV channel. This one time rice trader from Hissar, Haryana, has today
become a media baron and his other interest includes packaging, theme parks,
lotteries, and cinema multiplexes.
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He launched Zee Telefilms Limited in 1992 as a content supplier for Zee

V – India’s first Hindi satellite channel. Before the launch of Zee TV, viewers in
India were under the firm grip of Doordarshan, the state-controlled terrestrial
network.

After the launch of Zee TV, he commenced Siti Cable operations in 1995
and also started a joint venture with News Corporation. In 1995, he launched
two new channels, Zee Cinema and Zee News. In 2000, Zee TV became the first
service provider in India to launch Direct to Home services. In a short span of
time, Zee TV has become a big media and has given tough competition to
international media moghuls such as Rupert Murdoch.

Subhash Chandra Goyal after completing high school, began his

entrepreneurial career as a rice trader in Hissar. He became wealthy by exporting
rice to the Soviet Union. In the 1970s, he entered the packaging business; his
Essel Packaging Company was started by making laminated covers for the Food
Corporation of India, to store surplus agricultural harvests. Subhash Chandra
Goyal invested his profits in land, on which he built Esselworld, a 753-acre
popular amusement park in Mumbai. The next logical step was Zee-TV. The
idea of Zee-TV took shape during the Gulf War, when Chandra was watching
CNN in the office of Ashok Kurien, an advertising executive who was marketing
Esselworld.

Subhash Chandra Goyal launched Zee-TV in an era when many Indians

were eager to obtain news of the Gulf War. The huge audiences attracted by
Zee-TV and by Chandra’s related companies helped boost his net worth to
billions of dollars. However, Zee-TV is only one of the members Subhas
Chandra Goyal’s family of companies, which includes Zee Music, which
markets cassettes; Zee Cinema, a movie pay-channel; Siticable, a cable
television company; Zee Education (ZED), a computer training company; Zee
Multinational Worldwide, a Mauritius-based company; and Zee Telefilms, the
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flagship company that produces the television programming. Subhash Chandra

Goyal has also teamed up with his main competitor in private television
broadcasting, Rupert Murdoch who owns STAR-TV, as part of his News
Corporation. Subhash Chandra Goyal and Murdoch own equal shares in Asia
Today Ltd (ATL), a Hong Kong-based broadcasting company that provides
television programming to various broadcasting stations.

In 2000, the Zee group of companies was positioning itself to tap the
tremendous business opportunity offered by digital communication services in
India. For instance, Subhash Chandra Goyal’s Siticable Company, which he
owns jointly with Rupert Murdoch, is gearing itself to transmit voice, video, and
data for entertainment and e-commerce purposes. Siticable, with six million
subscribers in 2000, eventually becomes the biggest provider of cable internet
services in India. Subhash Chandra Goyal is also launching a $755 million
satellite telephony venture called Agrani (Sanskrit for "staying ahead"),
establishing a Zee Internet portal, and building 18 multiplex theater-cum-
entertainment centers, called ‘E-Citi’ in six states in India at a cost of over
$ 100 million. Subhash Chandra Goyal’s vision is to turn his broadcast software
operations into a media, entertainment, and telecommunications conglomerate.

Subhash Chandra Goyal understands very well the importance of building

a high-quality media conglomerate. The value of Zee’s stock rose by a drastic
15,000 percent in seven years after the company became public in 1993, making
it the fastest-rising Indian stock of all time. From Oberoi Towers, Chandra rules
the world of laminate packaging, supplying over 1,200 million laminated tubes
annually to the likes of Colgate Palmolive and Hindustan Lever, and, on the side,
beams programs to an audience of over 200 million people worldwide. Subhash
Chandra Goyal with his perfect outlook regarding Indian business domain has
reached a height of immense popularity in his versatile projects.
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43. SUBRATA ROY – SAHARA GROUP

Subrata Roy Sahara is the Chairman and Managing Worker of the Sahara
Group of companies based in India. Sahara India Pariwar is today the largest
first generation conglomerate of India. The group is successfully diversified into
the fields of Finance, Real Estate, Media & Entertainment, Tourism &
Hospitality, Services & Trading and Consumables. From an asset base of $ 43 in
1978 when it was founded, the group has today exponentially grown to become a
conglomerate with assets having a market value of more than Rs.2,15,000
crores.

It owns satellite TV stations, a bank, an airline, 33, 000 acres of real

estate and employs 700,000 people. Its directors are film stars, sporting heroes
and politicians. Sahara India Pariwar is the most famous company you have
never heard of. Its founder is Subrata Roy, the son of a mill worker in the
impoverished state of Bihar in northeast India. With just 2,000 rupees he set up a
savings scheme in 1978 for poor farm workers, visiting his customers door-to-
door on a Lambretta scooter.

Today, Sahara’s Para Banking empire extends to 32 million customers,

many of them making weekly deposits to the bank’s army of workers who visit
doorsteps across the subcontinent. It is the financial backbone of a business
empire said to be worth £7 billion but it is the marketing hoopla and showbiz
that will be the key to selling Sahara to expatriate Indians. And it is all good
publicity for the Sahara developments, satellite towns, shopping malls and gated
luxury leisure complexes catering to India’s burgeoning middle class. The
modest rural savers who entrust their rupees to Sahara’s doorstep bankers are
funding Amby Valley, a lavish complex of swimming pools, hotels and villas an
hour and a half from Bombay, and the Sunderbans project, a floating city near
Calcutta with water sports and a tiger conservation scheme.
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There is an airline, Air Sahara, two satellite TV channels and a weekly

newspaper, Sahara Time. Last year the company announced plans to expand into
life insurance and the ambitions are wider still, to capture the Indian diaspora in
Europe and America and, ultimately, the whole world, in the welcoming
embrace of the Sahara family.

44. SUNIL BHARTI MITTAL -BHARTI GROUP

Sunil Bharti Mittal is an Indian businessman. He is the Chairman and

Managing Director of the Bharti group since 2001. The $5 billion turnover
company runs India's largest GSM-based mobile phone service.

He has built the Bharti group, along with two siblings, into India's largest
mobile phone operator in just ten years. The UK based telecommunication giant,
Vodafone and Singapore's SingTel both own stakes in the recently renamed
flagship company Bharti Airtel. The group also has partnerships with Axa for
insurance and with the Rothschild family for exporting fruits and vegetables.

ENTREPRENEURIAL VENTURES

A first generation entrepreneur, he started his first business in 1976 at the

age of 18, with a capital investment of Rs.20, 000 borrowed from his father. His
first business was to make crankshafts for local bicycle manufacturers.

In 1980 he sold his bicycle parts and yarn factories and moved to
Mumbai. In 1982 he became the exclusive dealer for Suzuki Motors's portable
electric-power generators imported from Japan. The importing of telecom
equipment was banned by the Indian Government as ITI (Indian Telecom
Industry) monopoly practices and sole OEM for Department of
Telecommunication.
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By 1982, Mittal had started a full-fledged business selling portable

generators imported from Japan and that gave him the chance to involve himself
in activities like marketing and advertising. Things went smoothly until the
government banned the import of generators as two Indian companies were
awarded licenses to manufacture generators locally.

Sunil Mittal got interested in push button phones while on a trip to

Taiwan, and in 1982, introduced the phones to India, replacing the old fashioned,
bulky rotary phones that were in use in the country then. Bharti Telecom Limited
(BTL) was incorporated and entered into a technical tie up with Siemens AG of
Germany for manufacture of electronic push button phones. By the early 1990s,
Mittal was making fax machines, cordless phones and other telecom gear.

The turning point came in 1992 when the Indian government was
awarding licenses for mobile phone services for the first time. One of the
conditions for the Delhi cellular license was that the bidder has some experience
as a telecom operator. Mittal clinched a deal with the French telecom group
Vivendi. Two years later, Sunil secured rights to serve New Delhi. In 1995,
Bharti Cellular Limited (BCL) was formed to offer cellular services under the
brand name AirTel. Within a few years Bharti became the first telecom company
to cross the 2-million mobile subscriber mark. The company is also instrumental
in bringing down the high STD/ISD, cellular rates in the country by rolling the
countries first private national as well as international long-distance service
under the brand name IndiaOne. In 2001, the company entered into a joint
venture with Singapore Telecom International for a $650-million submarine
cable project, the countries first ever undersea cable link connecting Chennai in
India and Singapore.

Mittal has to his credit the breaking up of the 100 year old monopoly of
state run companies to operate telecom services in India. Now he heads a
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successful empire focused on different areas of business through independent

joint venture companies with a market capitalization of approximately
$ 2 billion, employing over 5,000 people and still growing. Bharti Foundation
has funded over 50 schools in Madhya Pradesh and also donated Rs.200 million
to IIT Delhi for building a Bharti School of Technology and Management.

In 2006, he struck a joint venture deal with Wal-Mart, the US retail giant,
to start a number of retail stores across India. In 2006, he attracted many key
executives from Reliance ADAG, NIS Sparta and created Bharti Comtel.

45. SWAMINATHAN, M. S. – MSSR FOUNDATION

Mankombu Sambasivan Swaminathan is an Indian agriculture scientist,

born 1925, in Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu. He was the second of four sons of a
surgeon. He is known as the "Father of the Green Revolution in India“, for his
leadership and success in introducing and further developing high-yielding
varieties of wheat in India. He is founder and Chairman of the MS Swaminathan
Research Foundation, leading the 'Evergreen Revolution'.

EDUCATION

M. S. Swaminathan’s childhood was happy and secure and he was

strongly influenced by the strong moral character and work ethic of his parents.
When Swaminathan was 11 years old, his father died unexpectedly.
Swaminathan bonded with and learned much from his uncle, a teacher and
scholar of English literature, Tamil and Sanskrit at Madras University. His early
schooling was at the Native High School and later at the Little Flower Catholic
High School in Kumbakonam. He was only 15 years old when he graduated
from high school in 1940. He went to Maharaja’s College in Ernakulam and
earned a Bachelor’s degree (B.Sc.) in zoology.
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Swaminathan was strongly influenced by Mahatma Gandhi’s belief in

ahimsa or non-violence to achieve Purna swaraj (total freedom) and swadeshi,
(self-reliance) on both a personal and national level. During this time of wartime
food shortages he chose a career in agriculture and enrolled in Coimbatore
Agricultural College where he graduated as class valedictorian with another
B.Sc, this time in Agricultural Science. He learnt an important lesson while
doing field extension work at Coimbatore: Men and women toiling daily in the
fields know their jobs better than a scientific expert. "Trust the judgement of
farmers."

In 1947, the year of Indian independence he moved to the Indian

Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) in New Delhi as a post-graduate student
in genetics and plant breeding and obtained his post-graduate degree there with
high distinction in Cytogenetics in 1949.

He began his lifelong association with UNESCO by receiving a

UNESCO Fellowship to continue his IARI research on potato genetics at the
Wageningen Agricultural University, Institute of Genetics in the Netherlands.
Here he succeeded in standardizing procedures for transferring genes from a
wide range of wild species of Solanum to the cultivated potato, Solanum
tuberosum. In 1950, he moved to study at the Plant Breeding Institute of the
University of Cambridge School of Agriculture. He earned his Ph. D degree here
in 1952. His work presented a new concept of the species relationships within
the tuber-bearing Solanum.

Degrees in hand, Swaminathan accepted a post-doctoral research

associateship at the University of Wisconsin, Department of Genetics to help set
up a USDA Potato Research Station. Despite his strong personal and
professional satisfaction with the research work in Wisconsin, he declined the
strong offer of a full time faculty position there, because his purpose of getting
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a foreign education was to equip himself for serving the cause of Indian
agriculture. He returned to India in early 1954.

Swaminathan's poor, overpopulated homeland was importing vast

amounts of grain. "Importing food was like importing unemployment," he
recalls. "Seventy percent of our people were employed in agriculture. We were
supporting farmers in other countries." By 1966, Swaminathan was Director of
the Indian Agricultural Research Institute in New Delhi, spending his time in
fields with farmers trying to help improve their productivity. Fertilizers were a
dead end: when the wheat plant's pod grew more seeds, its stalk collapsed under
the weight. With help from the Rockefeller Foundation, Swaminathan found a
cross-bred wheat seed, part-Japanese and part-Mexican, that was both fruitful
and staunch.

That was the breakthrough in the Green Revolution, but there was a lot
more work to be done. Indian farmers, immersed in traditional ways, had to be
convinced to grow the new wheat. In 1966, Swaminathan set up 2,000 model
farms in villages outside New Delhi to show farmers what his seed could do.
Then came the hardest part. He needed the government to help--specifically, to
import 18,000 tons of the Mexican seed at a time of fiscal hardship.
Swaminathan lobbied then-Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri. "He probably
thought nothing could be worse," Swaminathan recalls. "Famine was imminent.
There was a willingness to take risks." The first harvest with the new seeds was
three times greater than the previous year's.

But the revolution was still incomplete. Only Punjab state had the right
irrigation for the new technologies, the state-run food collection and distribution
networks were notoriously inefficient, and new fertilizers and pesticides were
needed, along with credit lines for small farmers. Political leadership was vital to
solve that tangle of problems, and Swaminathan found it in Shastri's successor.
"Indira Gandhi was a strong nationalist," he recalls.
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"She wanted an independent foreign policy, and food was a political weapon."
Gandhi bluntly asked him how India could be free of imports and gave
Swaminathan a free hand to organize a new agricultural program. Today, India
grows some 70 million tons of wheat a year, compared to 12 million tons in the
early '60s.

Swaminathan now believes farmers must adopt more eco-friendly

methods, and he is using his influence to spread the message. And although
populations continue to mushroom, he maintains that still greater harvests are
possible. All that is needed, he says, is "inspiration, perspiration and luck." The
greatest stroke of luck for hundreds of millions of Asians has been
Swaminathan's revolution.

Improved agricultural yields alone transformed India from a "begging

bowl" to a "breadbasket" almost overnight, nearly doubling the total crop yield
from 12 million tons to 23 million tons in four crop seasons.

His enthusiasm for passing on knowledge has earned him a reputation as

a lucid educator. And his record of community service and political leadership
has won him recognition as a profound humanitarian.

Dr. Swaminathan has long held that the key to enhancing the prosperity
of India-and many other nations-is to make agriculture the cornerstone of the
economy. By taking this new information to the farmer-at the farmer's level,
with field demonstration plots- Dr. Swaminathan bypassed the stumbling block
of illiteracy and converted a generation of Indians to a belief in the effectiveness
of modern agriculture.

Dr. Swaminathan has often been noted for his understanding of the
breadth of the entire food systems. His service in government is testament to
this: in several political leadership positions, he established programs of
ecological rehabilitation, rural development and technology transfer. His
 165

programs effectively helped subsistence farmers reap their fair share of credit
and income while conserving national resources. "Ultimately," Swaminathan has
stated, "it is the political will of the country to have policies in place which will
stimulate production by small farmers. Without it, all research, technology...any
external advice will go in vain."

46. SWARAJ PAUL – CAPARO

Swaraj Paul, an India based business magnate and philanthropist has

founded the multinational company Caparo, the UK based steel and engineering
group in 1978. He was knighted by the British Queen in the year 1978 and
became the Lord Paul of Marylebone and a member of the House of Lords.

Swaraj Paul was born in 1931 in Jalandhar. His father used to run a small
factory of making steel buckets and farming equipments. Swaraj was educated at
Punjab University and obtained a master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering
from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US. He joined the
Apeejay Surrendra Group, founded by his father after his returning to India in
1953. It helped him to build up a diversified industrial group.

The twist of fate came when Swaraj went to England in 1966 hoping to
find a cure for his leukemia-stricken two-year-old daughter, Ambika. Shattered
by her death, he took over the operations of Apeejay Overseas and relocated
permanently to London. He buried himself in work and there began his
spectacular business career in Britain.

In 1968, he started buying and selling steel in a one-man business and

acquired a small tube unit, Natural Gas Tubes (NGT). This developed into one
of the leading UK producers of welded steel tube and spiral-welded pipe. He
bought more units gradually, mainly in the steel products manufacturing
 166

industry and founded Caparo Group in 1978. Her Majesty the Queen knighted
Swaraj Paul in the same year, thereby making him The Lord Paul of Marylebone
and a member of the House of Lords the life peer.

Lord Paul reflects on the main events of his life in his memoirs, ‘Beyond
Boundaries`. It contains the details of his business career, including his
attempted takeover of the DCM and Escorts group. It also portrays his
association with the famous and the mighty, including the Indian political
dynasty of Indira Gandhi and her sons Sanjay and Rajiv. Beyond Boundaries is a
window into the making of one of the most outstanding success stories of
modern times. He has also written the biography of Indira Gandhi and was
awarded the "Padma Bhushan" by her in 1983.

The "Bharat Gaurav" honour was awarded to him by the Indian

Merchant’s Chamber. He holds the position ‘Pro-Chancellorship` of Thames
University in1998 and its Governorship (1992-97). Swaraj Paul was honoured
with the Chancellorship of the University of Wolver Hampton and the
University of Westminster. He is a member of the Foreign Policy Centre
Advisory Council and MIT`s Mechanical Engineering Visiting Committee. He is
the Chairman of the Olympic Delivery Committee with the key task of initiating
measures to acquire land and provide infra-structure for the London Olympics
2012.

This strict vegetarian donated twenty lakh rupees to the victims of the
October 2005 earthquake in India’s Jammu and Kashmir. Swaraj Paul stepped
down from the management of the Caparo group in 1996, handing over his
empire to his three sons.
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47. JRD TATA – TATA GROUP

Achievements: JRD Tata had the honour of being India’s first pilot; was
Chairman of Tata & Sons for 50 years; launched Air India International as
India’s first international airlines; received the Bharat Rathna in 1992.

JRD Tata was born in 1904 in Paris. His mother was French, while his
father was Parsi. JRD’s full name was Jehangir Ratanji Dadabhoy Tata and he
was popularly known as Jeh to his friends. His father Ratanji Dadabhoy Tata and
Sri Jamsetji Tata shared their greatness from the same great-great-grand father,
Ervad Jamshed Tata, a priest of Navasari.

JRD was the second son of four children. He was educated in France,
Japan and England before being drafted into the French army for a mandatory
one-year period. JRD wanted to extend his service in the forces but destiny had
something else in store for him. By leaving the French army, JRD’s life was
saved because shortly thereafter, the regiment in which he served was totally
wiped out during an expedition in Morocco.

JRD Tata joined Tata & Sons as an unpaid apprentice in 1925. He had
great interest in flying. In February 1929, JRD became the first Indian to pass the
pilot’s examination. With this distinctive honour of being India’s first pilot, he
was instrumental in giving wings to India by building Tata Airlines, which
ultimately became Air India. His passion for flying was fulfilled with the
formation of the Tata Aviation Service in 1932.

In 1938, at the age of 34, JRD was elected Chairman of Tata & Sons
making him the head of the largest industrial group in India. He started with 14
enterprises under his leadership and half a century later in 1988, when he left,
Tata & Sons was a conglomerate of 95 enterprises which they either started or in
which they had controlling interest. JRD was the trustee of Sir Dorabji Tata
Trust from its conception in 1932, which remained under his wings for over
 168

half a century. Under his guidance, this Trust established Asia’s first cancer
hospital, the Tata Memorial Center for Cancer Research and Treatment, Bombay
in 1944. It also founded the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, 1936, the Tata
Institute of Fundamental Research, 1945 and the National Center for Performing
Arts.

In 1948, JRD launched Air India International as India’s first

international airlines. In 1953, the Indian Government appointed JRD as
Chairman of Air India and a Director on the Board of Indian Airlines – a
position JRD held for 25 years. For his crowning achievements in aviation, JRD
was bestowed with the title of Air Commodore of India.

JRD Tata cared greatly for his workers. In 1979, Tata Steel instituted a
new practice; a worker is deemed to be “at work” from the moment he leaves
home for work till he returns home from work. The company is financially liable
to the worker if any mishap takes place on the way to and from work. Tata Steel
Township was also selected as a UN Global Compact City because of the quality
of life, conditions of situation, roads and welfare that were offered by Tata Steel.

JRD Tata received a number of awards. He received the Padma

Vibhushan in 1957 on the eve of the silver jubilee of Air India. He also received
the Guggenheim Medal for aviation in 1988. In 1992, because of his selfless
humanitarian endeavours JRD Tata was awarded India’s highest civilian honour,
the Bharat Rathna – one of the rarest instances in which this award was granted
during a person’s life time. In the same year, JRD Tata was also bestowed with
the UN Population Award for his crusading endeavours towards initiating and
successfully implementing the family planning movement in India, much before
it became an official governmental policy.
 169

JRD Tata died in Geneva, in 1993 at the age of 89. On his death, the
Indian Parliament was adjourned in his memory – an honour not usually given to
persons who are not Members of Parliament.

48. TULSI TANTI - SUZLON ENERGY

Tulsi Tanti is the Chairman and Managing Director of Suzlon Energy, the
$10 billion worth wind power based company. He along with his three siblings
own 70% of the company. He is from Gujarat where he started his first venture
which was in textiles, and then he moved into wind energy production and
founded Suzlon Energy. He is worth $930 million as per Forbes.

A commerce graduate and a diploma holder in Mechanical Engineering,

Tulsi Tanti originally hails from Gujarat and is presently based in Pune,
Maharashtra. Tulsi Tanti was earlier into textiles. He started his textile business
in Gujarat. But he found the prospects stunted due to infrastructural bottlenecks.
The biggest of them all was the cost and unavailability of power, which formed a
high proportion of operating expenses of textile industry.

In 1990, Tulsi Tanti invested in two wind turbines and realized their huge
potential. In 1995, he formed Suzlon and gradually quit textiles. Suzlon Energy
is the fifth largest wind turbine manufacturer in the world and the largest in Asia.
It is presently building what will be among the world's largest wind parks of its
kind at 1,000 MW capacity.

Suzlon is currently concentrating on a global expansion drive. It recently

acquired Hansen Transmissions, a Belgian maker of wind-turbine gearboxes.
Suzlon is also building a rotor-blade factory in Minnesota and has invested $60m
in a factory in Tianjin, China.

"Clean, green power is the best option," has been Tanti's motto and he has
been working ceaselessly towards this goal. The internationally acclaimed
`Time' magazine has recently named Tanti as one of the global "Heroes of the
 170

Environment" for successfully resurrecting the fledgling wind industry in India.

In spite of being a relative newcomer to the field of manufacturing wind energy,
Suzlon has been giving reliable service to global clients at competitive rates all
over the world and has also set up a marketing outfit in Denmark to woo
customers outside India. The company has already made an impact in China, US
and Australia.

So how did this small-town commerce graduate and mechanical engineer

from Rajkot, Gujarat grow into a power to be reckoned with in the area of wind
energy in India? Tulsi Tanti along with his three brothers who had inherited their
father's construction business, decided to step into an uncharted path - that is in
the textile business, in the late 1980s. Producing polyester yarn was the starting
point and later on they added furnishing fabrics to this burgeoning business.
However, they found that they were not able to achieve expected success and
sustain their business because of power-shortage and power-failure in Surat,
where their textile business was stationed.

At this point, they took upon themselves to develop wind power. Initially
when the Tantis pooled together a sum of $600,000 by selling some of their
family property, they went around enthusiastically as they tried to shop for
technology. The Tanti brothers wanted to craft their own wind turbines as they
were all engineers and were qualified adequately. However, they found that no
one was ready to part with their technology if they were not being given a stake
in the Suzlon equity venture. However, Tantis did not lose heart and persevered.
As luck would have it, Sudwind, a smaller company from Germany nosedived in
1997, giving the Suzlon people an opportunity to employ the Sudwind engineers
and create an R&D centre in Germany. An additional acquisition of another
technological company further added to the self-sufficiency of Suzlon.
 171

At the time he was managing the family textile business in Surat, a city in
western India. The business was languishing, mainly because electricity was
extremely expensive for businesses and the power grid was plagued with
outages. It was a source of great annoyance for Tanti. In 1994, he ordered two
wind turbines from Danish manufacturer Vestas, essentially taking his factory
off the power grid.

Other business owners began showing an interest in his solution,

prompting Tanti to wonder whether he might be in the wrong business. Was not
wind energy the real business of the future? He discussed his ideas with his three
brothers. Together they scraped together $ 600, 000 in seed capital, founded
Suzlon Energy and moved to Pune.

There was only one problem. None of the four brothers, all engineers,
knew anything about wind energy. But as customers, they were all too familiar
with the inadequacies of the industry. The turbines were supplied by the
manufacturer, installed by another company and maintained by a third. By the
time a turbine was up and running, the customer was often at his wits' end.

Tanti, realizing that a change was sorely needed, came up with the idea of
offering a complete package of wind energy services. Suzlon would simply
handle everything. Customers would not even have to install wind turbines on
their own premises -- instead, a customer could buy a turbine at a faraway wind
farm and would then own that turbine's output.

WITHOUT A FIGHT

The innovative aspect of Tanti's idea had more to do with the service he
was providing than with any feat of engineering. But it was a concept that would
revolutionize the wind energy business.

The brothers planned to purchase the sophisticated technology abroad,

eventually producing the turbines in India, where low production costs would
 172

give them an unbeatable competitive edge. But there was only one problem: The
leading European manufacturers were not about to give up their engineering
achievements without a fight.

Suzlon was forced, grudgingly, to enter into joint venture agreements

without gaining access to the technology. Tanti began his operations as a
distributor of wind turbines manufactured by the German company Sudwind.
Despite his initial reluctance, the arrangement would prove to be a stroke of luck
for Tanti's business.

Although Sudwind, a small company founded by students at the

Technical University of Berlin, built exceptional turbines, its engineer-owners
knew very little about running a business. Sudwind went into bankruptcy in the
late 1990s and Tanti seized the opportunity, acquiring parts of the Germany
company's R&D division. But instead of simply moving the technology to India,
Tanti hired the former Sudwind employees and set up an R&D laboratory in the
northern German city of Rostock. Existing designs were fine-tuned at the
laboratory, which also served as a training ground for young Indian technicians,
who would later return to India to build turbines with their newly acquired
expertise.

Similarly, Tanti managed to acquire a Dutch blade manufacturer. In 1999,

when the Indian state of Maharashtra, where his business was located, passed a
law that allowed companies to claim the costs of installing wind turbines as a tax
deduction, Tanti had it made. By 2002 sales at Suzlon quadrupled to $131
million.

ONE OF THE WORLD'S TOP WIND COMPANIES

Four years ago, investors urged him to sell the company. Tanti begged
off, telling them: "In a few years, Suzlon will be buying up the leading European
companies." As it turned out, he was right.
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Tulsi Tanti, till some years ago, was known for his achievements and for being
the 4th richest man in India. Now with a flourishing business and offices in the
US, Europe and Australia, he has soared even further. Suzlon Energy makes
wind turbines, which is the industry jargon for modern windmills used for
generating electricity. At present, Suzlon can be considered as being one of the
prime examples of India's manufacturing prowess.

His more established competitors in Europe realized long ago how much
of a threat this short man, with his carefully combed hair and thin moustache,
posed.

Speaking to TIME about the journey to become one of the most

successful entrepreneurs in renewable energy, Mr. Tanti said: "Yes, green
business is good business, but it's not just about making money. It's about being
responsible."

Mr. Tanti played a leading role in resurrecting the fledgling wind industry
in India, taking what was a fledgling industry just over a decade ago and
building the foundations for what is over a 2,000 MW an year market today.
This rapid growth of the market has led India to become the fourth leading wind
power market in the world.

49. VARGHESE KURIEN – NDDB

Achievements: Known as the father of the white revolution in India,

winner of the Ramon Magsaysay Award, awarded with the Padma Shri in 1965,
Padma Bhushan in 1966, and the Padma Vibhushan in 1991.

Dr. Varghese Kurien is also called the Milkman of India. He was the
architect behind the success of the largest dairy development programme in the
world, christened Operation Flood. He was the Chairman of the Gujarat
Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd. (GCMMF). And his name was
synonymous with the Amul brand.
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Born in 1921 in Kozhikode, Kerala, Dr. Varghese graduated with Physics

from Loyola College, Madras in 1940. Subsequently, he did his B.E.
(Mechanical) from Madras University and went to USA on a Government
scholarship to do his Masters in Mechanical Engineering from Michigan State
University. In between, he completed special studies in Engineering at the
TISCO Institute at Jamshedpur, Bihar, in 1946 and underwent nine months of
specialized training in dairy engineering at the National Dairy Development
Institute of Bangalore.

Dr. Varghese returned from US in 1948 and joined the Dairy Department
of The Government of India. In 1949, he was posted as Dairy Engineer at the
Government Research Creamery, a small milk powder factory, in Anand,
Gujarat. Around this time, the newly formed cooperative dairy, Kaira District
Cooperative Milk Producers’ Union Ltd., was engaged in a battle of survival
with the privately owned Polson Dairy, which was a giant in its field. Enthused
by the challenge, Dr. Varghese left his Government job and volunteered to help
Shri Tribhuvandas Patel, the Chairman of Kaira, to set up a processing plant.
This led to the birth of AMUL and the rest is history.

In 1965, the Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, created the National
Dairy Development Board (NDDB), under the leadership of Dr. Varghese
Kurien to replicate the success story of AMUL throughout the country. In 1973,
Dr. Kurien set up GCMMF to market the products produced by the dairies.
Under Dr.Varghese Kurien’s stewardship, India became the largest producer of
milk in the world. During his illustrious career, Dr. Kurien won many accolades
and awards. These include the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community
Leadership in 1963, The Padma Shri, the Padma Bhushan, Krishi Ratna Award,
Wateler Peace Prize Award of Carnegie Foundation, World Food Prize Laureate,
International Person of the Year, by the World Dairy Expo, Madison, Wisconsin,
USA and the Padma Vibhushan.
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50. VIJAY MALLYA– UB GROUP

Achievements: Chairman of the United Breweries Group, launched a

new domestic airline called Kingfisher Airline, Rajya Sabha MP.

Prior to being entrusted with the responsibilities of a classical Indian

corporate conglomerate, Vijay Mallya worked for the American Hoechst
Corporation (now Sanofi-Aventis) in the US and with Jenson & Nicholson in the
UK. Since 1980, he assisted his father, famous industrialist Vittal Mallya, the
then Chairman of The UB Group, in managing the important Brewing and
Spirits Divisions and in re-launching the Kingfisher Brand of Beer. In 1983, the
sales volume of the UB Spirits division was approximately 2.85 million cases
and UB's beer business trailed behind that of Golden Eagle from Mohan
Meakins. Also included in the Group were activities such as pharmaceuticals,
agrochemicals, paints, petrochemicals and plastics, the manufacture of electro-
mechanical batteries, the manufacture of food products and carbonated
beverages, a fast-food pizza chain and several medium and small scale industrial
units.

In 1988, Mallya became a non-resident Indian to pursue global

opportunities and to transform The UB Group into India's first multinational
company. While, in the initial stages, overseas representative offices had been
commissioned, the real break came in 1988 when Mallya, in a leveraged buyout,
acquired the global Berger Paints Group with operating companies across four
continents. The exit strategy for this investment was profitably executed when
Mallya successfully directed five Initial Public Offerings on the London,
Singapore, Nairobi, Jamaica and Abidjan Stock Exchanges. The paints business
was divested for significant value in 1996.

Mallya also founded a software company in the US in 1993 which was

subsequently listed on the NASDAQ in 1996 and which provides a considerable
window of opportunity to the vast US market. He also initiated
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several ventures for the promotion and globalization of UB brands and, in

particular, Kingfisher and McDowell.

In 2007, United Spirits Limited, the flagship of The UB Group, acquired

a hundred percent of premium scotch distillers Whyte & Mackay and Liquidity
Inc, a United States-based maker of specialty vodkas. The Delaware-based
Liquidity Inc produces specialty brands like Pinky Vodka and Marakesh.

The UB Group's Brewing Division has also assumed undisputed market

leadership with a national market share in excess of 48%. Through a process of
aggressive acquisition and market penetration, The UB Group today controls
60% of the total manufacturing capacity for beer in India. The flagship brand,
Kingfisher, is now sold in over 50 countries worldwide having received many
accolades for its quality.

Kingfisher, one of the flagship brands of The UB Group, has partnered

with NDTV, India's leading broadcast group in a first-of-its-kind media alliance
for the promotion of NDTV Good Times. The NDTV Good Times channel would
leverage from the editorial credibility and quality of the NDTV group and the
strong lifestyle appeal of the Kingfisher brand and icon, to offer Indian viewers a
world-class television entertainment experience.

Under his dynamic leadership, the group has diversified business interest
ranging fro alcoholic beverages to life sciences, engineering, agriculture,
chemicals, IT and leisure.

In 2000, Vijay Mallya entered politics, took over as the President of the
Janatha Party and became a Rajya Sabha MP. In 2005, Vijay Mallya established
Kingfisher Airline. In a short span of time, Kingfisher Airlines has carved a
niche for itself. In 2010, it made acquisition of Air Deccan, the no-frill airlines,
the first of its kind in India.
 177

Vijay Mallya has other interests too apart from business. He has won
trophies in professional car racing circuits and is a keen yachtsman and aviator.
He has also won numerous trophies in horse racing including several prestigious
Derbies.
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CHAPTER 5

FINDINGS AND SUGGESTIONS

1. AJAY PIRAMAL - PIRAMAL ENTERPRISES LIMITED

• Ajay Piramal took the company to a place among the top five
pharmaceutical companies in India through a string of overseas
acquisitions.

• Manufacturing is finite but human intellect is infinite.

2. AMAR BOSE - BOSE CORPORATION

• Amar Bose first displayed his entrepreneurial skills and his interest in
electronics at young age, when, he enlisted school friends as co-workers
in a small home business repairing model trains and home radios.

• Basically, Bose is a technocrat who focused his research on acoustics and

using his entrepreneurial acumen developed his career in the field of
acoustics.

3. S. ANANTHARAMAKRISHNAN – AMALGAMATION GROUP

• Remembered for his successful business practices, efficient management

of the labour unions and for triggering the growth of the automobile
industry of Chennai which has earned the city the epithet "Detroit of
India". As a result he himself came to be remembered as the "Henry Ford
of South India."

• Was responsible for the rapid expansion of the Amalgamations Group in

the 1940s through take overs.
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4. ANIL AGARWAL – VEDANTA GROUP

• Anil is unafraid of risk; once he has defined his goal, he will go to do it.
That is how he has turned around his companies. More importantly, his
attitude is to plough back what he has earned.

• Anil thought in terms of scale at a time when he had none. He is the

creative, new Indian entrepreneur, generating development and jobs and
aiming big.

• A pioneer who set India on the global metals and mining map.

• Led the Vedanta Group’s primary listing on the London Stock Exchange,
a ‘first’ for an Indian business house.

5. AZIM PREMJI - WIPRO

• Premji firmly believes that ordinary people are capable of extraordinary

things. He believes that the key to this is creating highly charged teams.
He takes a personal interest in developing teams and leaders. He invests
significant time as a faculty in Wipro’s leadership development programs.

• Premji has a fanatical belief in delivering value to the customer through

world-class quality processes.

• These are changing times. Yet in the middle of all the changes there is
one thing that constantly determines success. Some call it leadership. But
to his mind, it is the single-minded pursuit of excellence.

• Premji the businessman practices what he preaches. When it comes to

upholding personal values, there is no margin for error.
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6. BHAI MOHAN SINGH - RANBAXY LABORATORIES LTD.

• In early 1970s when Indian adopted a regime of process patents in the

Bhai Mohan Singh quickly realized that one could make any product in
the world through reverse engineering.

7. BRIJMOHAN LAL MUNJAL - THE HERO GROUP

• Brijmohan Lal Munjal is the first generation entrepreneur who started

very small and through sheer hard work and perseverance made it to the
top.

• Brijmohan changed the rules of the business by trusting his gut instincts;
introducing business norms that were ahead of their time, and by
investing in strategic relationships.

• Brijmohan built a series of bonds and networks with hundreds of family

members, vendors, dealers and employees. These networks are now the
glue that holds the Hero Group together.

• Brijmohan has been personally responsible for kindling a spirit of

entrepreneurship amongst his employees, and today, 40 of his former
employees are successful entrepreneurs.

• "Don't dream if you can't fulfill your dreams'' Brijmohan Lal Munjal is
often fond of saying.

• He could always visualize the applicability of technology before others

could.

• A frugal upbringing and a value system modeled on the famous Gurukul

system - which stresses the sanctity of the teacher-pupil relationship -
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imbibed in Brijmohan a strong sense of social commitment and

responsibility.

8. CHETAN MAINI - REVA ELECTRIC CAR

• Few among us have the luxury of pursuing a hobby so seriously that in

the end a mere extension of it will help us make a living. Chetan Maini is
such a rare example.

• He loves challenges. When he faces a challenge, he seems to get a lot

more energy and get the thought process in place that pushes him
forward. His business has been about challenges from day to day and that
is what really keeps him going. Some of those may be frustrating at
points, but when he sits back, looks at the issue, he generally tries and
changes that to an opportunity and refocuses his efforts.

• As for handling criticism, he always looks at what or how he could get

out from that. If someone is being critical, it is because they are seeing a
perspective that he does not see. So if someone has been critical, he
expresses his point of view, the advantages, and tries to convince them
his perspective and at the same time, hears their perspective and tries to
see what he should do differently to change their mindset.

• “Have an idea that you absolutely believe in. Surround yourself with
people who share that dream and focus on areas that are actually your
weaknesses”, he says.

9. DEEPAK PAREKH – HDFC

• Deepak Parekh is unofficially dubbed the government's informal crisis-

manager.
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• He has served as an invaluable problem-solver with innovative, creative

and credible alternate inputs that have shaped policy.

• It was his vision and entrepreneurial acumen that enabled HDFC to create
a niche in housing finance and emerge as the market leader.

• Known as a tough task master in HDFC, Parekh has the knack of

retaining his best people; hardly a single person from the company's
senior cadre - be it director, general manager or deputy general manager -
has left the organization in the last so many years. Employees attribute
this to Parekh's outstanding leadership qualities.

10. DHIRUBHAI AMBANI – RELIANCE GROUP

• Dhirubhai Ambani is remembered as the one who rewrote Indian

corporate history and built a truly global corporate group.

• He is credited with shaping India’s equity culture: attracting millions of

retail investors in a market till then dominated by financial institutions.

• He says “Till my last breath I will work. To retire there is only one place,
the cremation ground.”

• Remained on the top till the end by virtue of his ability to dream big and
translate it into reality through the strength of his tenacity and
perseverance.

• He is an example of what an ordinary Indian fired by the spirit of

enterprise and driven by determination can achieve in his own lifetime.
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11. EKTA KAPOOR - BALAJI TELEFILMS

• It was hard work, passion, and a fire in the stomach titanic struggle for
almost six long years which brought success to Ekta Kapoor.

• From the beginning she has worked, eaten and slept only with television -
thinking of concepts, casting, styling, selecting technicians, shooting and
scheduling, marketing and acquiring the new skills required to succeed.

• Success has changed her completely. She is now craving for more, open
to improvement and determined to make it to the top.

12. GALLA RAMACHANDRA NAIDU – AMARARAJA BATTERIES

• With his intense zeal and highly focused approach, Galla Ramachandra
Naidu propelled Amara Raja Batteries in the top league of battery
companies in India.

• He has promoted and established many companies from the conceptual

stage which are now well established and profit making.

• He saw the opportunity for marketing the latest technology batteries in

India.

• He always took bold decisions. When the company was started, he made
a decision to depend heavily on fresh recruits.

13. GAUTAM ADANI - ADANI GROUP

• It is his uncanny ability to spot scalable businesses that makes Adani a

visionary.
 184

• He owes his success to opportunities that came knocking on his door, but
more so to those he saw when no one else did.

• Adani is known to be a keen learner.

• He values management expertise above all and has built a strong team of
professionals to drive the group’s rapid growth.

• He believes in domain expertise. Secret behind Adani’s huge success - he

entered sectors which were still nascent and were largely government-
owned. He chose consciously such that there was not too much
competition.

• He may use his instinct to spot an opportunity, but after that everything is
well planned.

14. GHANSHYAM DAS BIRLA – BIRLA GROUP

• Ghanshyam Das Birla is considered as a doyen of Indian Industry.

• G.D. Birla was a multi-faceted personality.

• This noted businessman had to cover a number of obstacles as the British

and Scottish merchants with unethical and monopolistic methods tried to
close his business.

15. GOENKA. R.P. – RPG GROUP

• Goenka is one of the visionary Indian businessmen who wanted to take

advantage of post-independence emerging opportunities, move on the fast
track and grow. Within a short time, Rama Prasad Goenka successfully
forged business relationships with an amazing number of top
multinationals and paved the way to usher in new technologies to India.
 185

• Throughout his life, Rama Prasad Goenka has taken keen interest in
building business bridges for India with leading countries of the world
and attracting technology and investments from abroad.

16. JEYSINGH THOMAS - AVT GROUP

• Jeysingh Thomas was an entrepreneur and philanthropist, who

contributed to tapping technology to tackle the vagaries of monsoon.

• When many of the agri-businesses in the country were unable to cope

with the challenges because of their cyclical nature, he was among those
who successfully moved from a commodity based business to value
addition.

• Effective identification of markets and technological joint ventures

contributed to his success.

• His efforts at value addition in agro-processing were innovative.

• He had a sharp business mind and made friends for life and kept his
word.

17. JINDAL, O.P. - JINDAL GROUP

• Jindal always had the conviction that India should be self-reliant in every
sector of industry. He visited several foreign countries to elicit latest
industrial technical development and know-how. He acquired a great deal
of knowledge, which he aptly applied to enhance production of his
industrial establishments.

• He was a successful industry visionary and would remain as a role model

for others.
 186

• On account of his dedicated services to various sections of society

particularly, of the poor and backward classes, he was revered by all.
Jindal always advocated for granting a rightful place for weaker sections
in politics. He was above caste, politics and wanted all to come up
regardless of their caste, colour and creed. He firmly held the view that
all differences in life that exist today can be amicably resolved with
meaningful meetings and dialogues.

• Jindal's philosophy was that without the upliftment of weaker and

backward sections of society our dream of being a leading nation of the
world shall remain unfulfilled.

• Jindal's mantra was “where others saw walls he saw doors”. Then
whether it was opening doors or breaking down walls he always led the
way.

18. JOHN YESUDHAS, V.F. – WAVETEL

• Wavetel gave Chennai the concept of the first retailer delivering mobile
phones to doorsteps.

• Yesudhas has set up a chain which has given employment to 300

youngsters and has served 15 lakh Chennaites so far.

• They are also the first store (in the mobile market in Chennai) to get ISO
certification for all their chain stores.

• He brought in many innovative schemes like ‘buy one get one free’ in the
mobile industry and that sort revolutionized the trade.

• When it comes to offers, Wavetel is the trendsetter.

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• He is the first mobile retailer in the country to start a 24x7 call centre for
the customers which other dealers across the country followed.

19. KALLAM ANJI REDDY - DR REDDY'S LABS

• Dr Reddy’s Labs has been credited with turning the Indian bulk drug
industry from dependence on imports to self reliance and finally into the
export-oriented industry that it is today.

• Anji Reddy’s strategy is to expand, to create and to achieve much more at

a much faster pace and with a great degree of self-confidence.

• He saw to it that the moment they got into a city, they started as many
stores as possible there. Only that made business sense.

• As founder and its Chairman, it is his fervent wish that the innovative
spirit shall endure and will be passed on to the successive generations of
chemists and others and that this will form the backbone of this great
institution.

• He believes that through efficiency, they are helping the consumers save
more.

20. KARSANBHAI PATEL – NIRMA

• Karsanbhai Patel’s is a legendary rags to riches journey during which he

shattered established business theories and rewrote new ones.

• The process of detergent production is labour intensive and this gives

employment to a large number of people.

• Nirma focuses on cost reduction strategies to make a place for itself in the
market.
 188

• Nirma has always been known for offering quality products at affordable
prices and thus creating good value for the consumer’s money.

• Apart from other educational institutions, Nirma has also set up Nirma
labs , which prepares aspiring entrepreneurs to effectively face the
different business challenges.

21. KIRAN MAZUMDAR-SHAW - BIOCON LTD

• Kiran was not content to be an employee in a company.

• She set doable goals.

• Her unique vision has steered Biocon’s transformation from an industrial

enzyme company to an integrated bio-pharmaceutical company with
strategic research initiatives.

• She is a successful technocrat of global standing.

22. KISHORE BIYANI – PANTALOON

• Kishore Biyani is the unchallenged king of retail. He has the knack of

catching rivals off-guard and striking where it hurts most.

• He is the man you are most likely to ignore at the Pantaloon or Big
Bazaar store, as he stands in a corner observing the way you shop. But
make no mistake; what he may lack in sartorial style, he more than makes
up through his observation powers.

• He believes in taking quick decisions especially striking deals with other

companies. He leaves the task of relationship building to his managers.
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• A retailer by karma and a nationalist by dharma, Kishore Biyani prides in

being Indian and advocates ‘Indianness’ as the core value driving his
company.

• He stresses on the importance on continuous “Introspection” and is a firm

believer in learning, unlearning and re-learning all the time.

• His passion is ‘observing’. He is a compulsive reader.

23. KOCHOUSEPH CHITTILAPPILLY -V GUARD

• Kochouseph had a clear vision and foresight about the market potential
for voltage stabilizers in the days to come because of the poor quality of
power available and the potential for electronic items.

• He gives importance to self-esteem, mental peace, happiness and health.

This is a sincere remark from a genuine, straightforward businessman
who values ethics to the hilt.

• He is a leader as well as a team player and gives full credit to his

employees.

• It is perhaps his penchant to be original, passion for his brand, and a

common sense approach to management that keeps V-Guard stand apart
from the crowd.

• V-Guard scores on quality and after-sales service.

24. MOHAN SINGH OBEROI - OBEROI GROUP

• Oberoi can be aptly termed as the father of the Indian hotel industry.

• He was among the first to recognize the potential of the tourism industry,
its ability to contribute to India’s economic growth and
 190

generate direct and indirect employment. He worked tirelessly to put the

Indian hotel industry on global tourism map.

• Certainly he did not give much of the credit to luck. True, he stood at the
right time at the right place to confront his destiny, but this was just
physical happenstance.

• Perhaps the one philosophy responsible might be his dictum. “I never

worry. It clutters the brain. The problem may not happen, and even if it
does, worrying will only come in the way of a clear-headed solution.”

25. NARAYANA MURTHY, N. R. – INFOSYS

• Narayana Murthy had the vision to forge ahead in the computer and IT
industry and rightly picked up his colleagues who later became his co-
promoters of Infosys.

• The life lessons he has learnt are the importance of learning from
experience, the power of chance events, a growth mindset, and self-
knowledge what ultimately helps develop a more grounded belief in
oneself, courage, determination, and, above all, humility, all qualities
which enable one to wear one's success with dignity and grace.

• He emphasizes that entrepreneurship, resulting in large-scale job creation,

is the only viable mechanism for eradicating poverty in societies.

26. NARESH GOYAL - JET AIRWAYS

• When the government opened the airline industry to private competition,

Naresh Goyal jumped at the opportunity. He got in front of the wave
before it reached the shore.
 191

• Following the bad times in the airline industry, Naresh Goyal joined
hands with his prominent rival Vijay Mallya's Kingfisher Airlines, thus
making Jet Airways-Kingfisher not only the largest market player, but
also enabling both the airlines that would otherwise head for a collapse to
economize and save. This shows his business acumen keeping business
interests above personal interests.

27. DR. PRATAP C REDDY - APOLLO HOSPITAL GROUP

• Dr. Pratap Reddy revolutionized the health care system in India.

• He pioneered the establishment of private hospitals in India.

• Dr. Reddy has been pro-active in modifying government regulations to

suit current medical trends.

• He helped to ease import restrictions and made the government take a

liberal view on organ transplants among others.

• Apart from this hospital work, he encourages research work and

facilitates exchange programmes for doctors with other medical institutes
so that they may have a constant upgrade of knowledge and remain at par
with the best in technology and knowledge across the world.

28. RAMNATH GOENKA - INDIAN EXPRESS GROUP

• Ramnath Goenka is regarded as the first media baron of India.

• Ramnath Goenka took over the loss-making Madras edition of The Free
Press Journal, drove the delivery van himself to dispatch the papers and
started publishing it successfully.
 192

• He founded the Indian Express. Following this, both the Indian Express
and Ramnath Goenka openly challenged the British Raj.

• His critics believe that his passion for politics was the fire that led the
newspapers from Indian Express Group on a blazing trail.

29. RAMOJI RAO – RAMOJI CITY

• ''Discipline, inspiration and perspiration,'' is what media baron Ramoji

Rao, attributes to his success.

• He is one of the most versatile and hugely successful entrepreneurs in the

country today and has to his credit a host of flourishing businesses.

• Ramoji Rao is able to handle his varied businesses because he believes in

delegating authority and maintaining transparency in all his deals.

• He knows that there is no substitute for hard work. ''I set a goal and then
go ahead with dogged determination till I have accomplished what I set
out to achieve.''

30. RANGANATHAN, C. K. - CAVINCARE

• If you do not differentiate, you perish.

• Teamwork is the main reason for his success. Ranganathan believes in

team effort and collective, collaborative effort in decision making.

• He has good professionals who work really hard.

• The other reason of his success is innovation.

• He has the ability to take a risk and the ability to take a step forward.
 193

• He would like to be known for creativity and for injecting and spreading
the 'I can' spirit.

• He has proved that with a humble background it is possible to come up in

life. He wants to create similar people and kindle their desire. That is his
vision and mission.

31. RAO, G.M. - GMR GROUP

• A visionary businessman, G.M. Rao recognized the huge business

potential in entering the infrastructure space, with the opening up of the
power sector in the 90s in India.

• His commitment to the core infrastructure sector has resulted in the

Group exiting some of the highly lucrative businesses of banking,
insurance, breweries and jute.

• G.M. Rao has laid a strong emphasis in building a transparent and system
driven organisation.

• This serial entrepreneur, with a penchant for executing projects before

time, has always been ready to seize every opportunity that came his way.

• G.M. Rao’s thrust is on combining the best of entrepreneurial spirit with a

dynamic team of professional managers who work in an enabling and
vibrant organisational culture, to sustain and consistently meet his vision
for the Group of ‘Building Entrepreneurial organisations that make a
difference to society through Creation of Value’.

• G.M. Rao relishes beating competition decisively. Right from those

watershed college elections to bid for road projects where seasoned
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players were left guessing how the numbers worked, he has a will to win.

• “My father has always believed in focusing on one project till such time
that we secure it,” says G.M.Rao’s younger son. “This is why we have
managed to be successful in whatever we have taken up. Perseverance
and single-point focus is the clear message for all of us.”

• Passion for challenge has not only seen G.M. Rao scripting his own story,
but also changing his characters and goals to cope up with changing
scenarios.

32. RAUNAQ SINGH - APOLLO TYRES

• Raunaq Singh grabbed every opportunity which came his way.

• He started his corporate journey without a pedigree, higher education or

money, essential ingredients for success in corporate India, making it
possible for ordinary folks to dream big.

• He was among the first post-partition breed of businessmen who came to

India after the creation of Pakistan with nothing to fall on.

• He was a great advocate of economic liberalization and globalization of

the Indian business.

• He strived to put the Indian industry on the global map and worked
diligently towards this goal until the last day of his life.

33. SABEER BHATIA - HOTMAIL

• Sabeer Bhatia’s greatest accomplishment was not to build the company

but to convince people that this is their company...how this would
ultimately benefit them.
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• His role is an enabler and did not do the work.

• Ask what he does, and he will tell you only that he works in hi-tech, just
like hundreds of thousands of other young people in the Valley.

• He has a very regal air; he is a deep listener, a gentle giant.

• What really set Sabeer apart from the hundreds of entrepreneurs is the
gargantuan size of his imagination or dream.

34. SARATH BABU – FOOD KING

• Sarath encourages youngsters to become entrepreneurs, so that they could

provide jobs to other people. He also tells children - it does not cost
'money' to dream.

• Food business is not just about selling but also taking care of quality and
the people associated with it, Sarath points out. And how does he manage
his team? “I ask them to write their dreams on a piece of paper and advise
them to think of developing themselves,” says Sarath.

35. SATHISH BABU, D. – UNIVERCELL

• The ability to attract, develop and retain a spirited, motivated and

committed workforce is one of the key reasons for UniverCell's success.

• Judicious investment in technology and people has seen to that.

• Sathish Babu strives to constantly incorporate innovative retailing

concepts into his organization.

• Training and constant motivation are important elements of the

organization’s culture and Sathish Babu’s young staff are known for their
job knowledge, high morale articulation and pleasant demeanour.
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• Studying the buying behavior of his customers, Sathish understood that

what consumers really wanted was to make intelligent and informed
shopping decisions in an ambience that combined both comfort and a
high degree of service.

• “Opportunities are plenty. What is needed is a positive mind. Obstacles

will be there but you can overcome them as long as you do not accept
defeats as final. Try, try, and try. You can succeed. Perseverance will see
you through. This is how we have grown. Nothing can be achieved
without sacrifice. Even small, small sacrifices can give you greater
happiness. For instance, when building the business, it becomes
inevitable to miss a few family functions and other social occasions”, he
says.

36. SEEMA KAKKAR –REMANIKA

• There are no festivities in commitment. If you have made a commitment,

it has to be fulfilled; no matter, whether it’s a vendor, customer or
employees.

• Seema would recommend designers-fresh out of college-to work for at

least five years in established companies before starting on your own.

• Have a long-term vision, and remember time is never lost for following
your passion.

37. SHAHNAZ HUSAIN - SHAHNAZ HUSAIN HERBALS

• Shahnaz Husain has become known for her specialized clinical treatments
and therapeutic products for specific problems.

• Shahnaz has never been one to rest on her laurels.

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• She has always looked ahead, towards newer challenges, incorporating

the latest techniques and introducing unique innovations. Her natural
instincts and foresight have always led her to the next frontier, with her
finger on the pulse of international demands.

• Hers is the story of the human spirit that transcends geographical

boundaries and encompasses the entire world. It is a story that is an
inspiration to others to follow their dreams with faith and courage.

• The lady invented a marketing style uniquely her own; she decided to
make the brand a personality-driven one, flying in to various cities to
lecture on herbals and Ayurveda, inaugurating Shahnaz franchises and
salons, and returning the same day.

• In retrospective, Shahnaz attributes her success to her sheer grit and

determination. “I do not believe in destiny – the word fail does not exist
in my dictionary. I never fail, because I never stop trying,” she says.

• Having completed over 25 years in the business, the self-taught

marketing miracle reveals her formula for success. “In life, you get what
you negotiate. Any woman has the capacity to do what I did – it does not
matter what you want, what matters is how badly you want it.”

38. SHAMIT KHEMKA- SYNAPSE INDIA

• Shamit Khemka is a staunch believer of hard work and integrity.

• He performs silently and continues to let his works talk for them.

• Shamit faced every challenge that tried to hinder his progress with
inerrant determination.
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• He adds up his excellent managerial skills to become a complete package

that embodies the perfect prescription for success - both individually and
for all who contribute to his team.

• Shamit’s ability of identifying futuristic opportunities helps him to move

ahead of the time. His ability to smartly handle a situation is largely
responsible for his success today.

• Shamit Khemka has a knack of playing the lead role in every activity that
he indulges himself in.

• To walk with the pace of time, and stay ahead of it, he garners
information by reading books and browsing through the net. He keeps his
eye on latest trends and styles and encourages every member of his team
to enhance their knowledge base.

• If a strong value system works as the fundamental of this man, it results

into his committed determination that gets reflected in the form of several
successful endeavors.

• Like a true leader, he keeps his team aware of any impending challenge
and motivates them to achieve the newer height by conquering the limits.

• If foresightedness and hard work are two mandatory requirements to be

known as a successful individual, Shamit has both the pre-requisites
aplenty.

39. SHASHI RUIA – ESSAR GROUP

• Shashi Ruia imbibed the spirit of enterprise from his father who took him
along wherever he went to start a business.
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• The story of great businesses in the history of world has not been written
by wealth but by innovation, enterprising attitude, skill and an ability to
see beyond the present. Shashi Ruia probably is one such individual, who
has written his own history by dint of his courage and never-say-die
attitude.

• Ruia has not only masterminded the group's business strategy but has also
consolidated a whole range of activities through backward and forward
integration.

• Widely regarded as one of the architects of modern India, he has a

passion for education and mentoring young talent. He considers all
employees of Essar a part of his extended family.

40. SHIV NADAR - HCL

• Nadar’s contemporaries say that his great attributes include ability to

execute a business strategy ruthlessly and ambition to become the number
one in the business he enters into. These traits are complemented by his
hands-off management style: he adopts an idea and then gives his
employees a free hand to execute and build the business.

• In many respect he has been way ahead of times, he is a visionary who

thinks beyond his time and his gift from god is the ability to find the right
people for the right job, give them the right freedom to operate and reap
the benefits, says a former associate. Another feels that the main reason
for his success has been his ability to be a venture capitalist and
entrepreneur at the same time.

• While most others prefer a hands-on approach, he is the man who does
the least himself, apart from strategic thinking or prioritizing and leaves
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it to his team to find the best path to capture the objective. But is not that
leadership is all about.

• While he is quick to reward performers, Nadar is known to be ruthless

when performance is not quite up to his exact standards. The ruthless
attitude, in the final analysis, is the reason for his success.

• According to a former HCL group executive, Nadar is clinical while

evaluating new business proposals. He demands clear answers broken
into bottom line numbers. The questioning and discussions are so incisive
and frank that story goes that if Nadar is convinced, the business will
succeed.

• The bearded high tech entrepreneur nurtured HCL in his signature style
of decentralized management making it a billion dollar group with 100
offices worldwide. In the process, he created wealth for himself, his
associates and investors.

• In all these years, Nadar never lost sight of being a visionary. The
corporate restructuring he undertook over the years resulted in several
companies, each with a chosen professional head.

• In a short span of time, Shiv Nadar has reached pinnacle of success by his
hard work, vision and entrepreneurial spirit.

41. SINGH, K.P. – DLF GROUP

• Singh says that observing Welch's toughness with GE's managers in close
quarters provided a model for running DLF: Think big and be a sector
leader.

• DLF always aims for the very best from day one.
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42. SUBHASH CHANDRA GOYAL - ZEE TV

• Subhash Chandra Goyal was the first in India who sought to harness the
huge business potential of satellite television channels.

• It was Subhash Chandra’s vision that helped give birth to the satellite TV
industry in India and inspired others to follow suit.

• Zee TV became the first service provider in India to launch Direct to

Home services.

• Zee group of companies positioned itself to tap the tremendous business

opportunity offered by digital communication services in India.

• Subhash Chandra Goyal understands very well the importance of building

a high-quality media conglomerate.

• He was the first in the television industry to introduce employee stock

options.

43. SUBRATA ROY – SAHARA GROUP

• The company is the vision of a man who thinks he is the father of all his
employees.

• Subrata Roy believes he is the guardian of this family who has the right to
love and scold all members.

• He boasts that employees are not union members. It is private, a family

affair with no owner, the profits reinvested or distributed to good causes.

• The Sahara website says – “Our employees are not employees. They are
family members. All belong to Sahara and Sahara belongs to all.”
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44. SUNIL BHARTI MITTAL -BHARTI GROUP

• Sunil Bharti Mittal was one of the first Indian entrepreneurs to identify
the mobile telecom business as a major growth area and launched
services in India.

• Always on the move and making an impact and excelling in whatever he

did, this clear thinking risk taker has changed the face of the Indian ICT
space.

• In spite of his deep involvement in work, Mittal the man is calm, seldom
ruffled and very down to earth.

• ‘We are very fair to the people we work with (suppliers, buyers, staff).
We wanted to prove that even with meagre capital we could do bigger
things. Now a corporation, we are working to make it an institution.
There is no employee-owner situation here. Everybody is a co-owner and
now owns stock. It is a very enabling environment. There is no hire-and-
fire here’ he says.

45. SWAMINATHAN, M. S. – MSSR FOUNDATION

• Swaminathan’s stated vision is to rid the world of hunger and poverty.

Dr. Swaminathan is an advocate of sustainable development, especially
using environmentally sustainable agriculture, sustainable food security
and the preservation of biodiversity.

• His motto is "if conservation of natural resources goes wrong, nothing

else will have a chance to go right." He said, that: "I am firmly convinced
that hunger and deprivation can be eliminated sooner than most people
consider feasible, provided there is a synergy among technology, public
policy and social action".
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• He is widely recognized as the architect of the "Green Revolution" in

India, which radically improved agricultural yields through the
introduction of genetically superior grain varieties.

• Dr. Swaminathan has proven that he is not only a brilliant scientist, but a
capable administrator as well.

• His infectious enthusiasm and love of humanity have inspired and

motivated thousands of others to give whole-heartedly to the cause he has
chosen for his life's work: humbly serving the rural poor.

• Swaminathan combined all the great components of a revolutionary:

vision, dedication, energy and follow-through.

46. SWARAJ PAUL – CAPARO

• Swaraj Paul, an India based business magnate and philanthropist has

founded the multinational company Caparo, the UK based steel and
engineering group having learnt business lessons from his father at a
young age.

• His company developed into one of the leading producers of welded steel
tube and spiral-welded pipe in the UK.

• Lord Paul lives a very simple life despite being one of the richest people
in the UK.

47. JRD TATA – TATA GROUP

• As an industrialist, JRD Tata is credited with placing the Tata Group on

the international map.

• Leadership, according to JRD meant motivating others.

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• Mr. Tata was able to harness a team of individualistic executives,

capitalizing upon their strengths, downplaying their differences and
deficiencies; all by the sheer weight of his leadership.

• JRD initiated a programme of closer “employee association with

management” to give workers a stronger voice in the affairs of the
company. He firmly believed in employee welfare and espoused the
principles of an eight hours working day, free medical aid, workers’
provident fund scheme, and workmen’s accident compensation schemes,
which were later adopted as statutory requirements in India.

48. TULSI TANTI - SUZLON ENERGY

• Mr. Tanti is recognized for his personal vision and leadership in creating
Suzlon – one of the world’s leading wind power players.

• Tulsi Tanti, an entrepreneur, has made a long-lasting impression abroad

and brought glory to the ingenious and astute spirit of contemporary India
by exploring the possibilities of non-conventional energy.

• Tulsi is a tiger with a burning desire to play on the global stage. He wants
Suzlon to be among the top three wind energy companies in the world.
He has the determination of an uncannily shrewd businessman to be the
biggest renewable energy player in the world.

• When the Government of Maharashtra made an announcement that it

would support the creation of wind power, Tanti and team took upon
themselves to develop wind power. Tanti, realizing that a change was
sorely needed, came up with the idea of offering a complete package of
wind energy services.

• Despite his serious demeanor and modest appearance, Tanti is known for
his cunning and aggressive takeover tactics.
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49. VARGHESE KURIEN – NDDB

• Varghese Kurien is known as the Father of White Revolution (in India)

or the Milkman of India.

• He is one of the very few people who are not money driven in their cause
but work round the clock to bring about a change for the common man.

• He brought the benefits of modern technology and marketing to the

ordinary dairy farmer.

• Kurien's cooperative venture was built on a simple but compelling logic -

mass consumption and mass production must go hand in hand to bring all
round prosperity.

• Kurien's professional life has been dedicated to empowering millions of

humble Indian milk producers, in whom he saw an unsuspected economic
resource and potential at the bottom of the pyramid. ''Without their
involvement, we cannot succeed. With their involvement, we cannot
fail...'' remains his simple but fail-safe inspiration.

50. VIJAY MALLYA – UB GROUP

• Vijay Mallya initiated the process of defining a corporate structure with

performance accountability, inducting professional management and
consolidating the unwieldy empire into individual operating divisions.

• He has focused on areas of core competence and transformed the vastly

diversified UB conglomerate into a handful of key operating businesses.
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• Mallya is known for his myriad interests, his flashy flamboyant style of leadership and
his unorthodox style of management. His entrepreneurial style, his trade acquisitions
etc., reveal sharp business acumen.

• Following the Government of India's liberalized economic policies, Dr. Mallya

decided that the UB Group would only retain interests in businesses that were globally
competitive and which did not depend upon fiscal tariff protection. He also decided to
focus on areas of core competence and transformed the vastly diversified UB
conglomerate into a handful of key operating businesses.

• On entering the new millennium, the UB Group is considerably more focused and has
dramatically increased value for its shareholders through its various operating
businesses.

• Under his dynamic leadership, the group has grown into a multinational conglomerate
of over sixty companies. During this process, UB acquired several companies abroad.