The Successful Indian Entrepreneurs We Don’t Talk About

I was invited to give a talk at the Nashik Entrepreneurship Forum by Sanjay Lodha on angel investing. I had a great day because I learned a lot. I live in Mumbai, which is the economic capital of India. We Mumbaikars think we’re the leaders in the financial space, and know everything there is to know about investing. However, going to Nashik opened my eyes.

Shrirang Sarda, a director at Sarda Group of Companies, and Rajesh Malpani (sadly, I am not related to him) a director at Malpani Group in Sangamner, both gave a great presentation on how they have grown their family business.

They are third-generation family businessmen, who went to the US for higher education, and then came back to run the companies which they inherited. They are progressive and forward-looking, and it was inspiring to hear how these businessmen, who are rooted in Indian culture, have crafted such great success stories by transforming themselves into professionally managed family businesses.

They have successfully blended the best of both worlds, because they think global and act local. They have tonnes of domain expertise, a lot of which they have absorbed from their elders; and they can apply it scientifically using modern management principles.

Why They Are Different

Not only do they earn a lot of money, they also take extremely good care of their workers. Many of the perks they offer their employees are very innovative.

Here’s an example.

Indian weddings are expensive affairs, and they realised that a lot of their factory workers ended up in debt because of these marriage expenses. They started doing mass weddings for their workers, thus saving them a lot of money. An employer-sponsored mass marriage is a uniquely Indian twist on how to offer employee benefits creatively!

This is a great example of how empathetic founders who understand Indian traditions can create a win-win situation. Not only did employees gain by saving on the wedding expenses, the management also benefitted, because they created employee delight and loyal workers.

Based on the success of this initiative, they started a nursery school in the factory premises so that the mothers could continue to work; and book banks for educating their children, so that they could complete their schooling.

Enlightened management has helped to transform the lives of all their workers – and helped the town to progress dramatically as well. Not only have they become the employers of choice, they have also helped to reduce indebtedness by starting a workers credit society to rescue them from the clutches of the local money lenders (sahukars) who would charge exorbitant rates of interest.

Not Your Typical Startup Founder

Creating wealth is extremely important for India’s progress and these entrepreneurs have helped to create a thriving economy locally. However, they are not celebrated because they are not your typical startup founders. They need to be respected because they have started completely new verticals within an existing family business – for example, in renewable energy for the Malpani Group; and in dairy farming for the Sarda group.

These companies are extremely successful and very profitable and they have done this without taking any external funding. They are frugal and patient, and have a long-term vision, because they want to hand on their companies to their next generation, just like their forefathers did.

There must be so many of these success stories in Indian towns which unfortunately we are completely unaware of. Sadly, in India, we know more about the Silicon Valley success stories rather than these home-grown stories. They are excellent examples of how money can be intelligently grown when plowed into businesses which are very India specific.

We need to highlight more of these Indian success stories. I am sure there must be many more successful entrepreneurs in the smaller Indian towns which we are unaware of, because the media, unfortunately, doesn’t pay any attention to them. These businessmen do not lead flashy lifestyles, and do not crave media publicity – they just continue doing a great job creating wealth year on year without trying to seek the limelight.

These companies have been around for many generations, and have continued to grow with the changing times because they have adapted as India has grown. These businesses will continue to thrive, and there is a lot to learn from them.

[This post by Dr. Aniruddha Malpani first appeared on LinkedIn and has been reproduced with permission.]