Legacy: Letters from eminent parents to their daughters (8 page)

We are not sure where you got it from. Your mother says you got it from me because I myself was quite a wayward child who refused to be reined in. But we are sure the years of living on your own, from the age of ten when you went off to Aiglon College—a British-based boarding school in Switzerland—has a lot to do with the gifted young lady that you have grown up to be.

It was difficult for us to send you away to boarding because we were blessed with you after 19 years of marriage. However, having studied in boarding schools ourselves, your mom and I knew that the bonding that takes place with other kids in that environment makes for lifelong friends. The essential virtues of learning to give and take come easily when you are in boarding, sharing a dormitory with other children. Your mom and I were sure we did not want you to lead a charmed existence at home. Aiglon College in that sense was perfect. Your pride and spirit surfaced when your Humpty-Dumpty figure made you the target of teasing; but instead of buckling, you decided to dig your heels in and stay your ground. The teasing, in fact, seemed to have worked positively for you because you had proved to yourself that you were capable of much more, and went on to become Head girl of junior school at 14 and of senior school at 16. Before finally leaving Aiglon, you had made friends from some 40 countries, which in itself is quite remarkable.

Dear Anjali, that spirit has endured to this day. I still remember my amazement, and regret too, when I realized that instead of pursuing the Business Management degree that I thought you were going to take up in London, you had instead gone on to enroll yourself for a Masters in Arts at the prestigious St. Martins. Your heart was set on pursuing your passion for arts but you knew that I wanted you to study economics so that you could take interest in my business and take it to greater heights. But that did not dampen your spirits. You took your mother into confidence and for years you studied Arts during the day and pursued an evening course in Business Management at Westminster College, without me knowing what you were up to! And when I did find out, I had nothing but admiration for you.

Darling, when you came back to India at the age of 26, after 14 years of staying abroad, you were friendless and perhaps lonely here, but I am glad those times have passed and you have not just found yourself a splendid life partner in Jaisal but also given birth to a pair of infants, who you will raise, I am sure, with the same maturity with which you have handled yourself.

I know it has not been easy for you to integrate yourself with my business but it has been very satisfying to see you apply your sense of intuition into it and learn from your colleagues and all the people who have helped me build the enterprise. You have proved that you are no dreamer with your head in the clouds but a down-to-earth woman with your head on your shoulders and feet on the ground.

Anjali, you have spent the last 4 years intermittently following your own passions—painting, writing, photography, and setting up home with your life partner. As you now take on the responsibility of raising your infant children, balancing the competing demands of marriage, two sets of in-laws, motherhood, and business will be another challenge. Especially since you will manage the business, the demands on your time and intellect will be many. I personally am of the view that a woman is much stronger than a man. When it comes to tough decisions, a woman is able to withstand pressure better than her male colleagues. It is not just raising the child, the process of birthing itself gives strength that most men do not possess. A woman is in several ways tougher.

I’m sure you have grown up hearing of my own childhood in Lahore/Shimla and our relocating to Independent India. My father and grandfather had a flourishing business in Lahore but when we reached Shimla, we had to give up most of our landed wealth. My father was a stern man, very hard to please, and he did not expect that I would do much good in life. My father wanted me to take up a job or any small venture and be content with it for life, but I had a bigger dream. In some ways, I think that was why I worked doubly hard all my life, especially in the beginning, building up the auto component business that has today grown into a billion dollar enterprise with operations across continents. Did I ever think I would achieve so much success that I would employee 15,000 people and have homes in several cities and hill stations of India? No. But I did have a dream in my heart and the desire to turn it into a reality.

I started with the automobile industry when it was in its infancy in India and that gave me a head start over the Americans, the Japanese, the Koreans, the French, and the Germans who arrived in India in this space. I remained miles ahead of them, leading a diversified group with over a dozen joint-venture partners across the world.

Darling, I believe discontentment drives us. That is what drove me to grow a small enterprise into one of the biggest names in the automotive industry and help it expand to different corners of the country. Complacence kills enterprise. When I’m content, I am most frustrated. You are just like that my child. Multitasking comes easily to you and I am warmed at the thought that you too, like me, will work ceaselessly for a dream.

And yet, you are different and you have a mind of your own. I was taken aback and a little concerned when, on your return to India, you balked at the idea of working with me and of living with your mom and me. You told me you tried and that you did not think it was motivating enough. You wanted to live on your own, follow your own dictates, and set up luxury resorts with your husband Jaisal, in the beautiful outback of our country. I may have faced some extent of despondency but I knew that over time, you would understand the value of what I created—Rs 5000 crore in revenue and 15,000 people working for the group did not come easily and I know you will appreciate it better.

‘It will be different,’ you tell me, Anjali, when I suggest that you do things my way. I have got used to that and come to respect your stand on shared responsibility.

However, I do know that the values you learnt while we raised you won’t be different, because that is the essential part of a child’s upbringing, the legacy that a parent can leave for his or her children.

My dear, remember the time you first told me that you wanted to expand your own venture and set up luxury resorts? I was a little despondent at first but I decided to set you free because I knew that in order for me to make you buy into any kind of business sense, it was important to allow you to follow a business that you loved. And I must say you did a splendid job, developing your first resort, a 100-acre luxury property, ‘The Serai’, in the heart of Rajasthan’s desert land, toiling hard to get the project going, even with limited resources.

And when you found yourself running short of resources to grow and keep your business afloat, I was happy to have your business become part of the Anand Group, even though an auto component and engineering business has little in common with luxury resorts! I was glad when you saw the logic in agreeing to my suggestion since it gave you access to the manpower that we train within the group and also to the funds that our business can put into your project. Trained manpower is one of the biggest assets to any venture and I am glad you saw the opportunity and seized it. In some ways, that has also brought you closer to the business that I want you to eventually oversee.

Two years back when your mother had to fly to London for surgery, you did a wonderful job standing in for me as Chairperson of the Supervisory Board of the group. You surprised everyone with how well you conducted yourself, took control of the meeting, and managed exceedingly well on your own. I was happy at your level of maturity and how you managed the egos of senior executives, most of who have been with the group for decades.

I don’t know where this ability of yours came from but I am beginning to think it’s got something to do with your involvement in art. It has made me re-look what I thought about your decision to pursue art as a career. Maybe the process of painting is definitive, there is a method to the madness. You tell me occasionally: ‘Dad, you go all over the place when you talk. It is important to be precise and to the point.’ I agree, now.

Anjali, the early years of your childhood was spent in the company of your grandmother, who brought you up gently but firmly, and you imbibed from her the Sikh way of life and grew up to be a caring woman who respects her elders and is concerned about their well-being.

It brings me to the point of one of my own biggest assets in running my enterprise. At 27, when I decided to branch out on my own, I was never left floundering.

Occasionally, you may feel you are not equipped for business, I want to tell you that at every step you will have good guidance. Besides, I am confident that you have great leadership skills of your own.

As for me, I think what has helped me is my ability to relate to people and reach out to them at every level of the organization. When you live alone in various cities of the world, as I often do when I travel, you realise you know nobody, you are a stranger. The millions in your bank do little for you. However, if you have created jobs for people, know their families, are concerned about their kids’ education, that relationship itself is motivating and satisfying. I know you sensed and understood this well after you returned and you are quick to have adopted that interest in people. I believe our personalities develop with the challenges we face and that each individual is an embodiment of his accomplishments. My favourite theme in your growing years was ‘Education is not everything. It is the only thing.’ My child you have learnt well.

Sometimes, perhaps, you are too impatient with people. You don’t suffer fools easily but I want to tell you that we have to do that occasionally. I would ask you to be less judgmental. We have an Indian way of doing things, in the sense that we take time over things, and you have to learn to work with it. People are most often inefficient but they are not ill-meaning and so, we just have to get them going and make sure they deliver. Business is ninety percent about people. Technology, marketing, and everything else make up the remaining ten percent.

Now that you are getting yourself involved fully in the family business, I know you will deliver. Nobody respects you for the money you have. Respect comes from building upon what your predecessors have set-up or something that you have built on your own and from taking care of the well-being of all the stakeholders.

Anjali, there are other important things little to do with business that I want to share with you at this particular juncture. All those years ago, when you lived in Switzerland, I, along with the help of your mother, decided to prepare you to live an independent life. You had a bank account of your own that you learnt to operate with responsibility and that came from the faith that we entrusted in each other. When you empower people at a young age, they learn to handle responsibility and authority. When you returned home after your studies, I confess I was concerned that you would not be able to manage money, largely because you were an artist; but when you started living on your own and handling your own kitchen, your staff, and establishment, you proved to be more than responsible and mature.

Put your faith in people, Anjali, and they will repay you with their commitment and loyalty.

I too grew up in a family of ten siblings comprising of six sisters and three brothers and as I grew up, my network of friends expanded. My closest friends even now are those from my school days. Some of them are now dying on me. I have lost a couple of close friends who I had known for over fifty years and if I don’t make new friends, I am likely to be a lonely man. I have an American friend, Lee Perkins, who now follows the good weather across the country, living a full life in each of his five homes. I asked him once how he has so many friends in strange places and he said to me that it is a necessary art of survival. ‘You learn how to make new associations and friendships. Not all will be deep and long lasting, but they will be good relationships nevertheless,’ he told me. I think it makes good sense. At 86, Lee hunts, fishes, travels the world, and leads a more than active life, even at home.

As a woman growing up in a largely man’s world, there are a couple of things I want to lay emphasis on. Don’t let anybody take you for a meal without paying for it. Be financially independent, always. I know you practice this till today and I am proud of it, even if you sometimes do it with me too.

You grew up exposed to nature, spending your childhood gathering birds eggs on our estate and riding horses when you were a little girl of barely 6 and it saddens me that today you are no longer into sports, as much as you should be. I understand that arts and nature is what catches your imagination but I want you to understand that being engaged in sports is part of leading a full life. You know how a sport encourages team play and makes you tough emotionally and physically. Horse riding, for instance, teaches you alertness, develops your mind, and helps you to predict behavior—if you are not alert and watchful of the horse’s behavior, you risk finding yourself thrown on the ground. I know in childhood you have had a few falls from riding on the horse’s back.

Darling, I want you to live life to the fullest and cultivate a variety of interests. Being multi-faceted is a very important part of being a successful human being. Today, when several of my friends are retired from active professional lives and sitting in their clubs playing cards, I find myself unable to do that. Perhaps, if I had learnt the art of killing time at a young age, I would have enjoyed it but my youth was spent in building up my career with the result that today, I don’t even know how many cards a pack has! I know it has two Jokers! Thankfully, I have my own pet passions—Golf, movies, music, reading, watching an occasional play—which adds so much value to life. Let us not overlook my addiction to Italian, Chinese, Japanese, and Indian cuisine.