GRATITUDE: Letters from a Grandfather to his Future Generations. Chapter 24

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Chapter 24

Dear Family and Friends:

We have had the pleasure of welcoming our elder daughter in law Rajbir on a two day visit to Mumbai. With both her sons in University, she has closed the house in Toronto and moved back to Jakarta. Her Banvas is over, as she says. She met the larger family at the 5^th birthday of our grand niece, Naisha, daughter of Sofia n Vineet. The rain Gods were kind enough to bestow generous rains upon Mumbai city but did not disrupt her visit. She is now in Delhi to be with her parents.

Now, let us come back to the Forbes Group, post Khandwala’s death.

I recall asking a UK director of Forbes, in the days following Khandwala's death, as to what will happen to the Group. His answer was: The Group will survive but it will be changed.

Sure enough it was changed.

We were all apprehensive whether Tata’s will choose a Forbes Group person to be the successor.  Or if they deputed a Tata director, who would it be.  We all lent support to Dilip Madan as the Forbes Group’s heir apparent to the Chairman’s job. Madan moved himself to Chairman’s corner Office.

After some days of suspense, word came through that Dr. Freddie Mehta would be the new Group Chairman.

Since the Chairman’s corner office was occupied by Madan, Dr FAM made a virtue of necessity and carved out an office suite for himself by taking up the space used by Raja n  Ghadhiali n his Accountants. A new office was built for Raja; but Ghadiali and the Accountants moved to the 3^rd floor. Neighbours again!

Devoo, the good friend that he is, floated a proposal to take me on the Board of GNP, albeit as HR head for GNP. The Vice Chairman of GNP, a Tata director sent for me to persuade me. I told him that it was a smaller job and I would take my chances with the new Management.

After Dr Mehta had settled in, I briefed him on the role of HR in the Group. He was candid enough to say that things change. And change they surely did. By way of background, in those decades, Tatas did not have any significant central HR Function. The function was present in varying strengths in different Tata Companies. Those were the days of the late JRD Tata when large Tata Companies were kingdoms in themselves.

The business of Eureka Forbes was a bumpy ride. Nemmie Josiah was running the business and not leaving any elbow room for Akhil. Also the sales force was not fully attuned to payment by results. By now Madhav Kale had joined as CFO and Madhav Joshi as GM Engineering.

It was in these circumstances, that one fine day the Chairman summoned me and told me that I would be Director in-charge of Eureka Forbes and Akhil and his Team shall report to him through me.  It is quite probable that some ‘well wishers’ had put this idea forward to him.

Since Akhil was at his wits’ end, he accepted this with a smile. He was agitated about Nemmie not leaving any space for him in the main-line business of Vacuum Cleaners. I advised him to take ownership of the AquaGuard business and have some results to show for his effort. The product had been launched but was languishing.  In the initial stages a few hundred units were sold. But sale of AG had to be shut down due to many complaints reaching the Chairman and also Bombay House.  They regarded this as a nuisance product.  Akhil was again left without a product.

I then suggested to Madhav Joshi to run a survey of the installed units and see what lesson the data provided. It took some time, but the survey established that many of the Units were out of order. The good news was that the Units that were in working order, they were producing good quality water. We were encouraged that we had a good product but had to debug the quality issues. Obviously E’Lux had handed an untested product to us and we had to do the hard work.

I led a delegation of Akhil and Madhav Joshi and Dr Rao who was the expert on “water “  to the AG factory at Hyderabad.  Along with Mr. Rao, the Factory Manager, we methodically developed remedial measures for each of the quality problems.  Mr. Rao was v constructive about it and set to implement the same. It helps if your career depends on the product.

We also sensed that unlike Vacuum Cleaners, AquaGuard will need a strong ‘After sales service’ and we tasked Madhav Joshi to set up Service Infrastructure.

Sometime in 1984, Nemmie Josiah left the country and Akhil got charge of the thriving Vacuum Cleaner business.  

The AG sale had been re-launched, but complaints kept cropping up. The Chairman again stopped sale of AG. Akhil was less than enthusiastic about the product and was willing to let the product die. I had the conviction that good drinking water was a crying need in India and AG will have a large market. Therefore I was keen not to let the product die. After some more debugging of the product and strengthening of the Service organization, the Aquaguard business started to expand.  We did have some more hiccups along the way, but AG plodded along.

I do regard my self as the Godfather of AquaGuard and feel proud of the fact that Eureka Forbes’ successive Managements have taken this product and the Company to great heights.

The direct sale model of business puts a lot of emphasis on Salesman and his motivation. Therefore Eureka Forbes would have periodic ‘award’ functions to honor high performers who were achieving ever growing milestones. The purpose was both to reward high performance and to promote the spirit of competition not only among the salesmen but also their Branch Managers n Regional Managers.

When a company is in the growth period, %age growth seems meaningless. Akhil and I would set some growth targets for the next quarter and they would be overtaken by a mile.

It was therefore in fitness of things that we should recognize the performance of the President. Therefore at each Annual Conference of EFL, which was a mega prize distribution ceremony, I would carry a silver salver for the Chairman to present to Akhil to great applause.

At the introduction of the Chairman, a private businessman got us  to market a plastic tub washing machine of French design. He had set up a small unit in Hyderabad to manufacture these units. They were effective but not very sturdy and after a while the business petered out.

Photo Gallery follows.

Pls forgive any caption errors

But do please point out the errors.

                                                     .....oooooOOOOOooooo.....

Rajbir, aka Venus with Vineet n Amrik Singh ji

Naisha's 5th birthday 

Naisha, in pink, with her cousins, l-r Rishik, Ranveer n Harsimran
our Future Generation

Dr FA Mehta  with us at a Company function

Dr FA Mehta and Mrs. Katy Mehta at a Forbes Group Conference
(photo cropped due to deterioration)

Notice of my appointment as
Director in charge of Eureka Forbes

AquaGuard - an older model
still going strong at the Golf Club

A later day pic of an award Ceremony at EFL. Akhil is at right.
 His successor, and current Ex Vice Chairman, Suresh Goklaney is at left.

GRATITUDE: Letters from a Grandfather to his Future Generations. Chapter 23

COPYRIGHT RESERVED

BOTH FOR TEXT N PIX.

Chapter 23

Congratulations! To Nikki aka Asmit, daughter of Pinky n Honey Chawla, grand daughter of Sarno. She scored 95.4% in SSC Board Exams. Champ! She wants to pursue Medicine. Go for it Girl. Had a super (veg n teetotaler sans tea) Party at Food Court Desi Tadka at Growel Mall out in Kandivli Suburbs.  Good Fun. Good Luck.

My love n sympathies go out to Tara Chand Chawla on the sad n untimely demise of his 49 year old daughter Resham Wadhwa. Tara Chand is a director of  Kamani Oil mills and a very dear friend. We played golf together and became very close. Our prayers for the departed Resham and for courage for her parents n Family.

We have had house guests: Rani and and her husband Gurmeet.  She is  daughter of Gurdip Singh, Sukhjit’s first cousin. Rains did not stop us and them from having a good time. So short though the visit was.

                                             ………………….

And now , my dear family n friends, back to work… Fasten your seat belts.

We are now on the cusp of a cataclysmic event and far reaching changes in the fortunes of the Forbes Group and its Executives.

Let me delineate the persona of Girin Khandwala  aka GK, at this juncture.

He was perhaps our age. I don’t know anything about his  early life; nor  about his career in Forbes before I joined. As I mentioned, he was graduate of the Columbia Business School. His peers in the Group were Dilip Madan and Devoo Kothari.  Both were MDs of their respective Companies.

After Kemple left, GK was made Vice Chairman of FFC and Chairman of the other Companies. After the demise of the Chairman, he was elevated as Chairman of FFC also.

There is no doubt that Khandwala was an ambitious man. He had married a former secretary who, perhaps, stoked his ambitions. They had a son n a daughter. Their son, as a teen-ager,  would often get into bad traffic accidents n had to be rescued in the middle of the night. The daughter seemed more in control of herself.

Although GK was a  Professional Manager like most of us, yet he regarded himself as an entrepreneur and industrialist. In conversations, he would often liken himself to the Mafia Godfather. Upon the death of his resident Mother in Law, there was a huge gathering at his house. The coffin was laden high with flowers, garlands n wreaths. It was obviously a tribute to him and not the good old lady.  He remarked to me: it looks as if it is the funeral of the Mother in law of a Mafia Don; does it not?

GK was a generous man and man of his word. If he made a promises, he was not afraid to put it in writing and carry it thru. For example, when one senior executive was demurring to take up another job within the Group, GK promised him a house for himself. He took the offer and asked GK to put it writing. GK did that and the promise was fulfilled.

Khandwala was also a very sensitive and perceptive man: I recall on one occasion, he was with a couple of other colleagues when he sent for me to join them. I don’t recall the subject. I seemed to have nodded my agreement to the subject at hand. After the others had left, he said to me: You said YES, but your eyes were saying NO NO. Which was the very truth. I had not wanted to let him down before others; but had planned to put my reservations to him, after they left. But he had read my mind before I could get around to it.

GK was also a strict disciplinarian. Once he had pulled me up for approaching Mobil Shipping for a job for Kaka. He said: if you need anything from the Associates, come to me.  I learnt my lesson and avoided such potential conflict-of-interest situations scrupulously.

Although there were Managing Directors running the other two main companies in the Group, yet he tried to establish his writ within those Companies. He set up identical Chairman’s Offices in the Head Office of GNP and Patel Volkart and would visit those offices regularly. He would often conduct Management Meetings at Gokak Mills to establish his mark. He was a seeker of Power and pursued it methodically and relentlessly.

GK was elected Chairman of the General Committee of the Breach Candy Hospital. He was very active in that role. He charted and pushed thru major expansion n modernization of the Hospital. He got me n Uday also associated; me on the HR n IR Committee of the Hospital and Uday on some other subjects. He also tried to establish an association between Breach Candy and Columbia Hospital New York.  

Khandwala got both his children admitted to the Universities in USA. His son was a sweet boy. He would often visit our home and was very comfortable to be treated alongside our own sons. Also we would get together during my visits to Columbia and would have a meal together. I could see that he was happy at those occasions. In later years, we heard he had committed suicide in US. That was very sad and we felt his loss too.

GK’s daughter married an American and settled in the States. I have lost track of her.

Now, I am dancing around the main point of this Chapter.

The thing that was weighing on GK’s mind the early months of 1983, came to pass. One morning, Government agencies descended upon Forbes Building and homes of some of our colleagues. It was a raid. Apparently the authorities had found some incriminating evidence and suspected wrong-doing in the Foreign exchange area involving the Group’s overseas activities. One of the officers searched my office; asked me a few questions and that was it. They took Khandwala along with them to their office to question him.

He was there all day and was sent home late that night. I spent some time with him. I don’t recall who else was there. But there was some coming n going. Khandwala was very tense. He wouldn’t share what had transpired. He was very disturbed and kept blaming himself for the development. We tried to reassure him that whatever was there, we shall face it together; etc etc. He had been called to the Investigators’ office the next day. We left him late at night but were quite disturbed ourselves.

I don’t recall what kind of a night we had. But early the next day a frantic call got us rushing to the Office. We were told that GK had fallen from the 4^th floor window and had been taken to the nearby Hospital. We rushed to the Hospital to find his body on a trolley and were told that he was dead. From what we could see, there was no injury on the visible parts of his body. The staff confirmed that.

Thankfully, Dilip Madan, rallied the senior staff and we had a longish conference. Since we did not know what had actually happened, it was agreed to take the stand that GK had fallen from the 4^th floor. That was the answer we gave to the various queries that came on that day n later.

The worst had come to pass.  With his passing away, the Investigation petered out.

The visionary Girin Khandwala was no more and the future of the Group changed forever.

Que sera sera, what will be, will be….

More in my next… Suffice it to say that these events changed the course of my career. And that, more than once, Dilip Madan and Devoo Kothari have been steadfast well-wishers n supporters.

                                                     .....oooooOOOOOooooo.....

Photo Gallery Follows.

Pl forgive any caption errors.

Pls do point out any errors.

Jubilant Nikki in Red with her gals

Pinky at left - the proud Mom with Guljit and Jagjit

Proud Dad Harish Chawla aka Honey with Jagjit

Tarachand with his daughter Resham Wadhwa
in happier times. RIP Resham Beta

Gurmeet and Rani with Sukhjit and Guljit

Generous host Jagjit looking over the spread

late Girin Khandwala at a family function.

Friend n Support par excellence

My Supporter at all times Devoo Kothari and Indu behn

GRATITUDE: Letters from a Grandfather to his Future Generations. Chapter 22

COPYRIGHT RESERVED
BOTH FOR TEXT N PIX.

 Chapter 22

Dear Family n Friends:

I am sorry that I missed last Thursday release. I was laid up with fever and congested lungs.  My current Consultant had not realized that his line of treatment was not working and a new angle needed to be explored. I have shifted over to another well known Chest Physician. He suspects that I don’t have bacterial infection but rather fungal..  He also thinks that mine is not (any longer) a case of CPOD but allergic Asthma. He may be partly right. I do believe I have obstruction. I have gone thru the tests, he prescribed and await results.. Meanwhile, the medicines provided by the good Dr Sajnani seem to have worked and I am well out of this episode. I only hope that like the last four, this episode does not telescope into another episode. Hope in my heart and prayer on my lips.

It was nice to have Simran over for a few days. I wish I were in better health to do justice to this once a year opportunity. However we managed to do what we could. Thank you family for joining the lunch. We missed those who were out on a holiday. Next time.

With Harkirat going to University, Rajbir has shifted back to Jakarta. Happy Reunion, Venus n Mickey, after seven years dedicated to the boys’ education. Well done!

Well, let us get back to the Forbes story.

My boss, Girin Khandwala aka GK laid a lot of emphasis on education to bring about change within the Group.  He was looking for me to play an important role in this endeavor. He arranged for me to study at the Columbia Business School for a couple of weeks on 2-3 occasions. They issued me an ID: “Visiting Scholar”. Alas! I have not preserved it.

He also negotiated with the Dean, Boris Yavitz that Professors from the School will come out to India and conduct workshops for our Senior Executives. He had got the Dean himself to kick start the process at Tata Management Training Centre.

Mr. Uday Malik, the Deputy Managing Director of Goodlass Nerolac was the in house marketing Guru. He was deputed to Columbia to prepare the workshop outline along with Prof  Bill Brandt.  I had befriended the Prof during my visits. The workshop was held at Udaipur. It was a great learning and bonding opportunity for Senior Managers of the Group.

Next on, Mr. CT Ghadhiali and CG Shah were deputed to brief a Professor of Corporate Finance. Likewise I was asked to visit the Yale School of Business and brief Prof Victor Vroom the Human Resource professor. A common workshop was held in Mahableshwar; first half Finance and then Human Resources. This must have been early1982.

Towards end of 1982, we had worked on bringing in a Professor on Strategic Planning. The workshop was held at the now defunct Sea Rock Hotel early in 1983. Remember the serial bombing history. The Hotel was one of the Bombing sites. We in the Human Resource Function were a little concerned that GK had lost his enthusiasm on the eve of this workshop.   We were not to know at that time, but he had more important things on his mind.

I mentioned CG Shah. He was heading the Finance function of Gokak Patel Volkart and had to keep track of the Indonesian venture. He was a soft spoken but competent CFO and commanded respect.

Another financial expert in the Group was MD Kale. He was the CFO of IVP and assisted GK with Project Finance. In later years he was the CFO of Eureka Forbes.

While on the subject of Education, Khandwala continued to nurture his dream of setting up a Forbes University. The Group had formed a Trust for this purpose. During  the Conference in Mahableshwar, he led a delegation of few of us to look at a plot of land between M’war and Panchgani for setting up the University. He had also summoned the Group Architect, the late Mr Lokhandwala. It was a beautiful site on a hill overlooking a dam below. It was his dream that water supply could be pumped up from the Dam.

A few weeks ago I mentioned that my name had been suggested for heading IVP, and he was reported to have said that he had ‘other plans for Raj”. I guess that his plans were in the area of Education. He would often say ‘you will be the Vice Chancellor of Forbes University”.

Plans of men n mice. Suffice it to say:  It was only a few years ago that the Trust was liquidated.

I mentioned Uday Malik. He was Dy MD of GNP and headed the Marketing function. He and the MD Kothari were two different types of persons and would often come into conflict on decision-making jurisdiction. Uday, a product of Doon School liked  organization lines to be respected.

On one of their visits, the overseas directors of GNP, asked me to conduct an organization study of GNP and suggest ways to remove the friction between the two. We were trying to resolve a “Personality and Style’ problem by redrawing the organization. The obvious answer was Divisionalization. Now GNP was essentially a single business company: Paints. It had another business; Pigments, but it was relatively a v small operation.

After doing a lot of detail work with different levels in the organization, I recommended that Uday be made in-charge of the Paints Division and DMK apart from being the MD, take charge of the Pigment Division. I don’t think any of us had our heart in it. Yet the proposal was implemented. It did not remove the style conflict.  In course of few years, Uday left GNP and took up an assignment with another Paint Company.

Uday was a good friend of our’s. I mentioned that we had a few HR n operating personnel who would meet socially. We would drink, eat and play cards, by turns at each other’s home. Of course many of them would smoke and I was oblivious to the damage their second hand smoke was doing to my Lungs. The bill came much later. Uday was a regular fixture in that Group. He n his wife Vimla were great hosts too.  Others in the Group were Dilip Haji, now in Singapore; Gupte, now retired and, of course the late Joglekar, Khanapurkar , Sujan, Gokhale of Greaves, lawyer PK Rele. I may have forgotten one or two of the ‘card group’ members.

I said Gokhale of Greaves because, we had Bal Gokhale within the Group. Long before I joined, he was in the Finance Department of Forbes but had left. Sometime in 1981 he was recruited to head the Forbes Engineering Divisions as General Manager. He was given General Manager’s designation and director level remuneration. Management had to apply the same to some existing Executives. Bal again left the Group. He was recruited for the third time as Deputy Managing Director in GNP after Uday had left. More of him in future Chapters.

The Group had another major activity: Shipping agency. Late Mr. NM Mehta led the FFC agency of American President Lines n Recruiting agency for Mobil Shipping. TV Mahadevan led the PatVolk agency of Mearsk n some other lines. In the days of the Foreign exchange controls, these were cash cows, since they required v little capital, but handled a lot of cash on behalf of Principals. In course of time, NM retired n was followed by N Mahalingam. TVMahadevan also left some years later. I have lost track of them and many other colleagues from those days.

                                                   .....oooooOOOOOooooo.....

Picture Gallery Follows

Pls pardon any caption errors.

Pls do point out any errors.

Simran at the Golf Club
Full Member from 21st birthday

Women Power
l-r Sweety, Anu, Swarna, Sukhjit Sofia n Namita

Sim with Manpreet

At the Family Lunch
l-r Amrik Singh ji, Harjit n Guljit 

Jagjeet with his gr'son Ranveer

At  Office Puja with Sukhjit, Nirmala and Raja

Diwali Wahi Pooja

CG Shah 

Uday Malik, past Deputy MD, GNP,  a dear friend
 n member of the 'Card Group'

GNP Sales Conference, before my time. Uday in the middle
8th from either side