Nikhil Kamath x Kumar Birla | People by WTF Ep #5

Speaker 0:00 [upbeat music]

Nikhil Kamath 0:41 If you had one chance to redo life today, starting afresh, you're not Kumar Mangalam Birla, but you're just Kumar starting off. What business would you put the money in? [upbeat music] Firstly, thank you for, uh, doing this. So the format of this is very casual. It's typically a bunch of friends sitting and chatting. How it started was I used to have a, a few people over for dinner in Bangalore on the weekends, and some of the conversations we had were so interesting that a lot of people would go back home from dinner and say that, "You know, I wish more people could be a part of that."

Kumar Birla 1:32 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:32 Like, extremely contrarian opinions on different viewpoints, so stuff like that.

Kumar Birla 1:38 Oh, that sounds interesting.

Nikhil Kamath 1:40 Yeah. So this is all in, like, uh, an effort to help many people who could learn from your own journey. Uh, most of our audience are entrepreneurs and wanna-be entrepreneurs who are quite young, in the age bracket of, I would say, fifteen to thirty-five, forty. And, uh, from-

Kumar Birla 2:04 Starting at fifteen?

Nikhil Kamath 2:05 Yeah, very young. And a lot of them want to be entrepreneurs, and they could learn a lot from your own journey. So if I could start at the beginning, wherever you wanna talk, and think of it as a two-way conversation. If you feel like you want to ask me anything-

Kumar Birla 2:20 Sure, sure.

Nikhil Kamath 2:20 ... feel free to ask me-

Kumar Birla 2:23 Yeah

Nikhil Kamath 2:23 -anything about anything, and I will try and answer as honestly as I can.

Kumar Birla 2:27 Done.

Nikhil Kamath 2:28 Theek hai?

Kumar Birla 2:29 Mind, I end up asking you more than you ask me. [chuckles]

Nikhil Kamath 2:31 [chuckles]

Nikhil Kamath 2:33 So tell us-

Kumar Birla 2:34 Okay

Nikhil Kamath 2:34 ... uh, a little bit about the early years. First, uh, vivid memory that comes to you from childhood. Start from there.

Kumar Birla 2:46 Yeah, so very happy childhood, to say the least. Very secure, lots of, um, laughter, uh, great sense of positivity, high energy, uh, you know, very, uh, close family ties.

Nikhil Kamath 3:03 And where was this?

Kumar Birla 3:05 So a part of it was in Calcutta.

Nikhil Kamath 3:07 Right.

Kumar Birla 3:07 Uh, the rest of it was in Bombay. But, uh, you know, on holidays, I always went back to Calcutta-

Nikhil Kamath 3:14 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 3:14 ... because the larger family was there. So for me, childhood means Calcutta much more than Bombay. Uh, it's very secure. I think it just gives you, uh, an anchor and very strong roots.

Nikhil Kamath 3:26 And, uh, what era was this?

Kumar Birla 3:29 Era? [chuckles]

Nikhil Kamath 3:30 Yeah. [chuckles] What generation?

Kumar Birla 3:31 We moved to Bombay in '69, I think.

Nikhil Kamath 3:33 Mm.

Kumar Birla 3:34 So at least for the n- next twenty years after that.

Nikhil Kamath 3:37 Right. Leading up to this, I watched all your interviews. Uh, everything from-

Kumar Birla 3:44 There aren't too many.

Nikhil Kamath 3:46 Yeah, there's so few.

Kumar Birla 3:47 I don't, uh... Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 3:48 Yeah. There's very few about you. There are a couple about you acquiring a company, entering the ARC business-

Kumar Birla 3:56 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 3:57 ... uh, talking about Ratan Tata

Nikhil Kamath 4:00 at his demise, stuff like that. But the one interview I found of you was twenty-six years ago, I think Simi Garewal.

Kumar Birla 4:09 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 4:09 What led you to do that?

Kumar Birla 4:10 Simi Garewal. I just thought it was interesting. Um, I don't know. She's a friend-

Nikhil Kamath 4:15 Uh.

Kumar Birla 4:16 -so also couldn't say no, to be honest.

Nikhil Kamath 4:18 Right.

Kumar Birla 4:18 Uh, liked the format. It was kind of fun.

Nikhil Kamath 4:22 Mm.

Kumar Birla 4:22 Um, yeah, is it still there on, on YouTube?

Nikhil Kamath 4:26 Of course, yeah.

Kumar Birla 4:26 Yeah. That was very early years. I think my father had just passed away less than a year ago.

Nikhil Kamath 4:32 Right.

Kumar Birla 4:32 So life was different then.

Nikhil Kamath 4:34 Right. You looked very fashionable in that interview. You had, like, this double-breasted-

Kumar Birla 4:43 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 4:43 ... I would say, what? Brown, brownish paint.

Kumar Birla 4:45 Yeah, camel color, I think.

Nikhil Kamath 4:47 Camel color jacket.

Kumar Birla 4:50 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 4:50 This is not something people talk about. Like, if you were to tell me what is the... Ask me, "What is the difference between camel brown suede and, I don't know, nude color?" I wouldn't know.

Nikhil Kamath 5:00 But is this-

Kumar Birla 5:01 Nor would I.

Nikhil Kamath 5:01 Yeah?

Kumar Birla 5:02 No, I wouldn't.

Nikhil Kamath 5:03 Is there a creative element in you hiding somewhere?

Kumar Birla 5:05 Of course. I think I'm essentially a creative person.

Nikhil Kamath 5:09 Mm.

Kumar Birla 5:09 And for me, the most creative thing you can do is build or run a business.

Nikhil Kamath 5:14 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 5:15 Uh, I think there's so much of creativity that goes into that, into that. Don't you think so?

Nikhil Kamath 5:23 To a certain extent, yes. But beyond a certain extent, for a-

Kumar Birla 5:27 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 5:27 ... business that has reached the scale that yours has-

Kumar Birla 5:30 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 5:31 ... is it creativity as much as it is risk-taking ability and efficiency?

Kumar Birla 5:38 Risk-taking and efficiency, of course, is always a part of any business.

Nikhil Kamath 5:42 Right.

Kumar Birla 5:42 Uh, I think as a business grow, grows larger and scales up, uh, you know, you need to be more and more creative because, uh, all the s- sort of, uh, low-hanging fruit are done with-

Nikhil Kamath 5:54 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 5:55 ... uh, and you've got to keep creating value. Uh, so I think you actually need to be-- that's when management turns from being a science into an art.

Nikhil Kamath 6:03 ... Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 6:04 Um, and therefore, I think that phase of a company's life, when you've got scale, when you're maybe the largest or second-largest player, uh, you're required to think really out of the box. So more creativity re- required, I would think.

Nikhil Kamath 6:20 So grew up in Cal- Calcutta and then Mumbai. Which school did you go to? Do you remember anything from those times?

Kumar Birla 6:26 I went to Campion.

Nikhil Kamath 6:28 Okay.

Kumar Birla 6:28 Um, I remember school quite well. Very tough environment, very strict, uh, environment, so a little different. Uh, not too much of fun for a better part of it. I think we all enjoyed, uh, you know, class nine and ten, because then you grow up and you have your own sort of, um, uh, you know, you're real in- independent of, uh, school authority. Uh, but, um, good fun.

Nikhil Kamath 6:55 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 6:55 Uh, very simple, very cosmopolitan. Uh, you know, I mean, at our time, at that time, it was all very simple stuff. Excited to run and get a, get an ice cream, uh, during recess, that kind of thing.

Nikhil Kamath 7:08 Right.

Kumar Birla 7:08 Getting whacked for not getting the right book and not wearing the right kind of shoe. Uh, that was the kind of school that it was.

Nikhil Kamath 7:16 Mm-hmm. Were you a good student?

Kumar Birla 7:17 I was a good student for a big part of, uh, I think till grade eight, after which I slipped considerably. I don't know why.

Nikhil Kamath 7:25 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 7:26 Uh, but yeah, up until class eight, very good.

Nikhil Kamath 7:32 Did everyone in school already associate you with the Birla and all that comes with it?

Kumar Birla 7:39 You know, like I said, it was a very, very cosmopolitan, uh, bunch of students from all walks of life. Uh, we were also quite innocent and naive because we didn't have social media to spoil us, for example. So quite in our own cocoon.

Nikhil Kamath 7:56 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 7:56 Uh, of course, people knew the family name and all of that, but it really didn't affect anyone in any which way. Uh, I, I was just one out of a class of forty, let's say.

Nikhil Kamath 8:07 Right.

Kumar Birla 8:08 So, um, it was... That, that was, uh, sort of, um, the good part about school. Uh, you didn't get any special attention at all-

Nikhil Kamath 8:18 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 8:18 ... uh, which was, which was nice.

Nikhil Kamath 8:23 Did media work differently back then? When you say your classmates did not know or the school did not treat you differently, even though, uh, you were the, in a way, scion of one of the largest business families of India.

Kumar Birla 8:38 There was hardly any media then, Nikhil. I mean, you had Doordarshan for the most of my years at school.

Nikhil Kamath 8:45 In the '70s?

Kumar Birla 8:46 Uh, in the '70s and early '80s. Um, so it was, uh, media wasn't a big part of our lives.

Nikhil Kamath 8:55 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 8:55 Maybe more radio, but, uh, nothing that was, uh, you know, intrusive or sensational. It was all very sort of day-to-day kind of news or world news or political stuff, from what I remember. Nothing on business families or nothing that, uh, you know, made you stand apart.

Nikhil Kamath 9:16 Did you, do you have any insight into psychologically

Nikhil Kamath 9:20 how you were as a young boy? What your attachment styles were? Did you get along more with your mother or your father? Uh, what were your aspirations back then and your fears back then?

Kumar Birla 9:33 Wow! You really are getting me to go back in time. Um, like I said, it's been family for me, for me all along. Uh, you know, I think strong family ties, uh, makes you a different kind of a person.

Nikhil Kamath 9:48 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 9:49 I've, um, I've always been closer to my mother, but was very strongly bonded with my father as well.

Nikhil Kamath 9:56 Mm.

Kumar Birla 9:56 So in our generation, uh, chances were that there was a distance between a father and a son, and that was almost kind of, uh, you know, the done thing or the norm. Um, but obviously, we were very connected. Um, we all lived together. I think I didn't have any fears, or I didn't have any very complex thoughts or feelings, to be honest. When I look at, uh, children of that age now, their lives are so much more complex, right? Uh, they about, they know about every student in every school in Bombay-

Nikhil Kamath 10:33 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 10:33 ... uh, and what happened. I mean, if something unusual, out of the way, was to happen-

Nikhil Kamath 10:39 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 10:40 ... let's say a kid was caught taking drugs, the whole of, uh, the city's children would know about it.

Nikhil Kamath 10:47 Right.

Kumar Birla 10:47 Although it wasn't, uh, in their school, maybe.

Nikhil Kamath 10:49 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 10:50 For us, it was one class above us, one class below us. That's all we knew.

Nikhil Kamath 10:54 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 10:55 We were quite happy with ourselves. So I don't remember having any kind of fears. The only fear was about exams, maybe. Um, as simple as that. I, I was always a last-minute student and got into trouble with my father for that, so that was perhaps the only fear. Uh, aspirations at that time, again, you, you know, we were so unexposed in many ways.

Nikhil Kamath 11:19 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 11:19 So it was all about school. It was a- about school. It was about, uh, you know, you hung out with some friend, lots of cousins. Not too many aspiration at that point in life, to be really honest. Just, you know, uh, almost one exam to the other, so to speak.

Nikhil Kamath 11:34 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 11:34 Uh, they were the sort of, uh, bookends of life at that point in time.

Nikhil Kamath 11:40 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 11:41 Um, so it was quite of a, you know, uncomplicated, easy childhood. I don't remember feeling any kind of complex, uh, inferior or superior. I don't feel... I never felt any jealousy or envy or nothing negative at all. I think it was always, um-... that was always the atmosphere at home as well.

Nikhil Kamath 12:06 Right.

Kumar Birla 12:07 Uh, a little stressed because I created that stress for myself. I wanted to always do well. Not that it was, uh, you know, thrust on me, but that was an expectation I had for myself. That perhaps was the only stress, uh, at that point in time.

Nikhil Kamath 12:25 If you had to go back in time and think of the most stressful thing that happened to you between the grade of five and ten, is there a memory that pops up?

Kumar Birla 12:37 I think the ICSE exams, they were quite, uh, you know-

Nikhil Kamath 12:39 The tenth standard.

Kumar Birla 12:41 Uh, grade ten. Uh, very hyped up-

Nikhil Kamath 12:45 Mm.

Kumar Birla 12:45 -very scary for most of us.

Nikhil Kamath 12:48 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 12:48 That, uh, by far was, uh, uh, the most scary thing up until class ten.

Nikhil Kamath 12:55 Right.

Kumar Birla 12:56 Otherwise, I mean, it was just a very simple childhood. We grew up, a lot of cousins together. Uh, you know, lots of fun. Uh, I mean, I studied as well. Soon after that, I started to study for my CA. But up until tenth, it was only about the-

Nikhil Kamath 13:14 Studying

Kumar Birla 13:14 ... the most worrisome thing in life was, uh, examinations.

Nikhil Kamath 13:18 Right. Uh, a lot of what we are today, I'm a psychology fiend, so I like reading books on psychology. Not that I know too much, but the little bit that I know tells me that a lot of how we are today are deter- determined and defined by events that happened in that duration of our life.

Kumar Birla 13:41 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 13:41 Uh, and I've said this before, but I find that a lot of very successful people today are building on top of some kind of confrontation, avoiding confrontation, vicariously viewing confrontation, or, uh, something shameful that happened. It could be as simple as a teacher slapping a child. Uh, how that shame is felt by the child and how you build around it and what it becomes when you're an adult is a completely different thing. Did you have any stark moments like that which went into defining who you are as a person today?

Kumar Birla 14:21 At school?

Nikhil Kamath 14:23 Or at home.

Kumar Birla 14:25 You know, I, I... There was nothing at school. I did get whacked around a couple of times by teachers. That was more about, you know, talking in between classes and stuff like that.

Nikhil Kamath 14:33 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 14:33 Nothing that left any kind of impact at all. As the impact at hu- at home was huge.

Nikhil Kamath 14:39 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 14:40 Uh, so my grandfather was alive, my great-grandfather was alive at the time.

Nikhil Kamath 14:44 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 14:45 Uh, my grandfather and father were obviously there, all three working. Um, so high energy, I mean, I used to see all of them, and there was so much to learn just from a chat like this on the dining table. Um, a lot of perspective about life. I think that a lot of my, uh, self-assuredness comes from that phase of my life, uh, because they were encouraging, um, happy to let you explore. At the same time, there was a sense of doing one's duty and doing it well. Uh, discipline was something that, uh, you know, uh, I remember as being a hallmark of the family, in a nice way.

Nikhil Kamath 15:28 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 15:29 Um, so yes, I think those years, uh, uh, the school years, influences at home were much stronger. And I agree with you, I think that those years actually shape you to become the adult that you become. Uh, very secure, like I said. So I think the self-assuredness comes from a sense of great security. Um, yeah, it's a very happy time.

Nikhil Kamath 15:55 Do you remember

Nikhil Kamath 15:56 how each of them were different from the other? Grandfather from father-

Kumar Birla 16:00 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 16:00 ... to great-grandfather?

Kumar Birla 16:02 You know, they were all products of, uh, different, uh, time frames. So my great-grandfather was, uh, you know, pretty much a, a product of, uh, pre-independent India.

Nikhil Kamath 16:15 Right.

Kumar Birla 16:16 My grandfather, a time of scarcity-

Nikhil Kamath 16:19 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 16:19 ... because that's the time that he, uh, kind of represented, the time that he was active in his career. My-

Nikhil Kamath 16:27 Scarcity by virtue of India flirting with socialism?

Kumar Birla 16:31 Socialism. Also, we were obviously, um, you know, um, at a nascent stage of being a developing country.

Nikhil Kamath 16:39 Right.

Kumar Birla 16:40 Um, so I mean, you sort of lived within your means. You didn't spend too much. Uh, it was a very different... The mindscape at that time was, uh, very different. My father grew up in a liberalized India.

Nikhil Kamath 17:00 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 17:01 Um, and I think, you know, the businesses, uh, that you run also shape you as a person.

Nikhil Kamath 17:07 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 17:08 It's not just the other way around. So all of them were pretty distinct. My father was more expansive in his view on business. My great-grandfather, of course, played a very important role in just building Indian industry at-

Nikhil Kamath 17:21 Mm

Kumar Birla 17:21 ... at the grassroots level, uh, just pre- and post-independence. Um, my grandfather was, uh, more conservative, uh, and he was a numbers person, so he drove his businesses, uh, through numbers, so to speak. So pretty different, all of them. Uh, interesting.

Nikhil Kamath 17:40 So when your grandfather was around in a time of scarcity, ra- in the country overall, when he saw that change, did he change?

Kumar Birla 17:51 No, he, he remained very much the same. He passed about five years ago.

Nikhil Kamath 17:55 Mm.

Kumar Birla 17:55 And I happened to go and open his cupboard after that, looking for something. He had five kurtans, kurtas and dhotis and three suits, and that was about it.... uh, just to get him to make a new suit for himself-

Nikhil Kamath 18:08 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 18:09 -was like a major project for, uh, my grandmother and my aunt. That, that's the kind of, you know, life that they were used to-

Nikhil Kamath 18:16 Mm.

Kumar Birla 18:16 -and that's the kind of life that, uh, we got exposed to through them.

Nikhil Kamath 18:21 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 18:22 So I don't know many people who have had, uh, or who, who've been told to go back, uh, into the room and put off the light or the fan.

Nikhil Kamath 18:30 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 18:31 That for us at that time was, you know, pretty kind of common because it, it was expected that when you l- leave the room, you put on the fan, you put off the light. Uh, so we had a brush with that also-

Nikhil Kamath 18:44 Mm.

Kumar Birla 18:44 -since we were growing up then. Uh, and that in itself, that in itself is a, is a, big piece of learning.

Nikhil Kamath 18:53 And your father, very different to your grandfather?

Kumar Birla 18:58 Very different. Um, the values pretty much remained the same, but I think he was, uh, more of a risk taker, wanting to, um, expand, uh, his business outside the country more aggressively. It was also a different India, right?

Nikhil Kamath 19:14 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 19:15 Uh, so you could take bigger bets than, say, my grandfather could.

Nikhil Kamath 19:19 Right.

Kumar Birla 19:20 Didn't have the opportunity then, in any case.

Nikhil Kamath 19:22 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 19:23 So yeah, they were all three very different people. I had a great, uh, rapport with all of them. Um, every equation was very different, as you can imagine. Um, so yeah, a lot of love and a lot of, um, uh, a lot of good cheer and laughter.

Nikhil Kamath 19:41 Closest to your grandfather and then your father?

Kumar Birla 19:46 Uh, difficult to say actually, Nikhil. Very different-

Nikhil Kamath 19:49 Mm.

Kumar Birla 19:50 -equations with all of them. Um, my great-grandfather at that time, when I was growing up, I spent a couple of hours every Sunday with him, so for me, he was just my best friend. I'd drag him for a movie, and, um, he'd take me to the aquarium. That was pretty much the only thing you could do in Bombay at the time. Uh, my grandfather was doting. He just loved me immensely. Um, you know, just an ocean of love, both of them. My father was a, a tough taskmaster, so when I started going to work, I saw an avatar of him that I really hadn't experienced before.

Nikhil Kamath 20:31 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 20:32 Um, which was different. Uh, you know, I think when in our company, people come to me and complain about being under a tough boss, I'm thinking in my mind, you know, they have no idea what a tough boss, uh, can be all about.

Nikhil Kamath 20:49 Can you elaborate? How, how was he tough? Like, what do you say-

Kumar Birla 20:53 Uh, he was tough because he just... Uh, you just had to be on top of things all the time. Uh, you couldn't nap at the wheel, even for a minute in the day. You'd get caught out, uh, in some way or the other. Uh, so he was just very demanding. He was... Uh, he also gave me a lot of space, I must say.

Nikhil Kamath 21:12 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 21:13 Much more than, let's say, fathers at, uh, that time did.

Nikhil Kamath 21:17 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 21:18 But he was also very demanding. Uh, and, uh, you know, he was very driven and very demanding of himself as well, so I think that was fair.

Nikhil Kamath 21:28 Mm-hmm. What age were you when he passed away? [clears throat]

Kumar Birla 21:34 I was twenty-eight, uh, Nikhil. He was, uh, fifty-two, so-

Nikhil Kamath 21:38 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 21:38 -obviously he died, uh, very young-

Nikhil Kamath 21:41 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 21:42 ... uh, and tragically. I think that shaped all of our lives, uh-

Nikhil Kamath 21:47 Mm

Kumar Birla 21:47 ... differently after his passing.

Nikhil Kamath 21:50 What did you feel when he passed away? I'll give you a personal story. My father passed away, like, ten, eleven months ago. What are your thoughts as soon as something like that happens, when it's unexpected? And how do your thoughts evolve after one year, two years, and five years? What was the first thing that happened to a twenty-eight-year-old Kumar when father abruptly passed away?

Kumar Birla 22:15 No, so he was suffering from cancer for two years.

Nikhil Kamath 22:17 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 22:18 It's just that, uh, you know, the cancer kind of galloped. We thought he had ten years, and he suddenly took ill and things, uh, took a turn for the worse. Um, the first thing actually was a sense of relief for him-

Nikhil Kamath 22:32 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 22:33 ... because he'd gone through so much of pain for those two years-

Nikhil Kamath 22:35 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 22:36 ... that I, you know, I, I really couldn't see him suffer anymore.

Nikhil Kamath 22:40 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 22:41 It was very evident that he wouldn't be able to, uh, lead a normal life again.

Nikhil Kamath 22:46 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 22:47 And he wouldn't be happy not, not being able to do that. So I really think the first feeling was one of relief for him. Then you start to feel this emptiness. You... I, I never really thought this would happen. You did feel, uh, a sense of loss.

Nikhil Kamath 23:04 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 23:04 You also started to feel a sense of big responsibility-

Nikhil Kamath 23:07 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 23:07 ... uh, that, you know, falls on you. And I think, uh, work was my biggest escape.

Nikhil Kamath 23:14 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 23:14 Uh, got involved with that. Wanted to also, uh, give back to him in some way-

Nikhil Kamath 23:20 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 23:20 ... by carrying forward his name, his legacy, and doing the work that, you know, he had wanted to do but couldn't complete.

Nikhil Kamath 23:28 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 23:29 And I think that was a huge, uh, sort of, like I said, an escape. Uh, working very long hours, but doing things that you know he wanted to do but couldn't. And that kind of, I think, blunted the, uh, you know, s- sense of emptiness to a large extent.

Nikhil Kamath 23:49 If you could change one thing about your father while he was alive, one character trait... Uh, most people, when we, when we speak about people who have passed away, uh, we have to euphemize the bad and embellish the good, almost.... right? Uh, all humans have plus, plus, plus, and minus, minus, minus. And I find it hard to do it today 'cause it's only been ten, 11 months, it's probably too soon. But if I have to tomorrow figure out why I am the way I am, and what traits I inherited from my father, I'll have to like, at some point, be objective about this whole thing. So if, if you had to change something about your father, vicariously living like him-

Kumar Birla 24:46 Hmm

Nikhil Kamath 24:46 ... while he was alive, what would you change?

Kumar Birla 24:48 You know, retrospection, Nikhil, is a very powerful tool.

Nikhil Kamath 24:52 Hmm.

Kumar Birla 24:52 So it's, um, all very well for me to say that he could have been different in this way and that way, but, uh, I mean, what? At, at the most, I could say that he could have spent more time with us, but-

Nikhil Kamath 25:05 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 25:05 ... you know, he was in a phase where he was building his career.

Nikhil Kamath 25:08 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 25:09 Uh, I went through that phase myself-

Nikhil Kamath 25:11 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 25:12 ... and I know what the pressures of that phase, uh, of one's career, uh, can be like. I, I don't think that I would've wanted him to be any different. Um, you know, all of us have, uh, our rough edges, we have our pet peeves. He had his as well. But, um, I think he was a good man, he was a good father.

Nikhil Kamath 25:36 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 25:36 Uh, protected us, pushed me quite a lot, um, because I think I needed to be pushed at that point in time.

Nikhil Kamath 25:44 Are you like him?

Kumar Birla 25:46 I'm very different from him. Uh, we are all pretty different people, actually. I think circumstances, I think, uh, you know, uh, the shape of your own childhood-

Nikhil Kamath 25:59 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 25:59 ... uh, people in your life-

Nikhil Kamath 26:01 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 26:02 ... everything is different. I was always also very encouraged by everyone to be my own person-

Nikhil Kamath 26:07 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 26:08 ... whilst I was growing up.

Nikhil Kamath 26:09 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 26:10 Uh, that was a constant refrain, you know, "Be your own person." My great-grandfather used to tell me that a lot. Um, you know, I think I was in class five or six, and I remember him saying, "You know, you've got to take your own decisions now. Uh, any important decision of your... concerning your life should be yours." And he'd come to Bombay every couple of months, and he'd always ask me this: "Have you started taking your own decisions, or are your parents taking your decisions for you?" You know, in, in that kind of an environment, think about it, uh, you are empowered, right? You're given the currency to, uh, make important decisions, uh, and be, uh, you know, an independent decision-maker. I think, I think that was just terrific. I mean, that worked really well for me. Um, I always had a mind of my own, my father knew that. Uh, he, he really pushed me hard, like I said, and I think, you know, I, I'm really grateful to him for that. Uh, I was, uh, sort of a bit of a dreamer then.

Nikhil Kamath 27:16 Hmm.

Kumar Birla 27:17 Um, and that drive, uh, you know, was required-

Nikhil Kamath 27:23 And what did you dream about?

Kumar Birla 27:23 ... which, which he pushed me into. He almost pushed me off the precipice, so to speak.

Nikhil Kamath 27:28 And-

Kumar Birla 27:29 Uh

Nikhil Kamath 27:29 ... when you say dreamer, what did you dream of doing? What does the alternate life look like?

Kumar Birla 27:33 Nothing. I had no other plan. I always wanted to join him at work.

Nikhil Kamath 27:37 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 27:37 Um, I didn't have an alternative, to be honest, but luckily for me, I had no other, you know, sort of burning desire to do something else or some great talent. Uh, this was something that I'd grown up seeing around me, I'd always been fascinated by, and, uh, so it was pretty much taken for granted. Uh, and that's what I actually wanted to do as well. I just found that the conversations, uh, that the three of them had, quite, uh, interesting always. Uh, you know, the way they spoke about a business situation, setting up a new business, about their people. They also had their own teams, all three of them, and their teams were also quite different from each other. In some way, the reflection of, uh, you know, the leader, the three of them. Uh, so business always fascinated me, you know, so I, I, I don't think I had... There was no issue there about, "I want to do this, but they want me to do that," or, you know, "I have a great talent which I'm not able to pursue because I have to join the family, um, in business." That, that phase luckily

Kumar Birla 28:50 didn't happen with me at all.

Nikhil Kamath 28:51 They say something very interesting about attachment types. I've always tried to figure out mine, and I feel like I'm avoidant attached. I'll give you an example. If three children were left alone in a room, and their mothers leave the room-

Kumar Birla 29:08 Hmm

Nikhil Kamath 29:09 ... the children start crying. The mother of the first child comes back and cuddles the child, the child stops crying immediately. The mother of the second child comes and cuddles the child, the child takes a certain amount of time of crying, b- after which the child stops crying. The third child, the mother leaves the croo- room, does not cry, and the mother comes back into the room, acts like she doesn't care, and does not give attention or acknowledge the mother's presence. If you had to put yourself in one of those boxes, which one would you be?

Kumar Birla 29:45 As a parent or as a child?

Nikhil Kamath 29:47 As a child. As a child.

Kumar Birla 29:48 You know, I- since, uh, we were quite a few members in the family-

Nikhil Kamath 29:53 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 29:53 ... uh, my grandparents, my aunts, two aunts, my, those are my father's sisters, who I've, uh, been very close to, my grandparents, parents, who were a very sort of integral part of my life.

Nikhil Kamath 30:06 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 30:07 So you kind of, uh... And my great-grandfather, my parents, of course.... you know, each one had their own kind of, like I was saying, pet peeve.

Nikhil Kamath 30:16 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 30:17 Uh, they were all different personalities. Sometimes when I look back now, I almost feel that it was choreographed, you know? One was being a good cop, one was being a bad cop.

Nikhil Kamath 30:25 Mm.

Kumar Birla 30:26 Um, but, uh, you know, net-net, that worked quite well actually. Uh, if, let's say, I had a parent who be- believed in, let's say, in tough love, and no one to, in, in the family to soften that for me-

Nikhil Kamath 30:39 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 30:41 ... I, I think that would have been much tougher. Uh, but when you have, uh, when you're attached to so many people in the family, it gives you a broader base-

Nikhil Kamath 30:50 Right

Kumar Birla 30:50 ... a broader emotional base. So it worked, uh, as a, as a team, I think, you know, like a pack.

Nikhil Kamath 30:56 Mm.

Kumar Birla 30:57 Uh, and that's true for all of us, I think. We all kind of, you know, we're part of a family, obviously, and like a pack.

Nikhil Kamath 31:04 In love today, is it like that? In a relationship where you're in love with the other person, are you very emotionally availably attached to the person?

Kumar Birla 31:17 Who, me?

Nikhil Kamath 31:17 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 31:19 Um, very easily emotionally available, yes, but to very few people. Uh-

Nikhil Kamath 31:26 Who comes on top of that hierarchy?

Kumar Birla 31:29 The children, of course. I think that's true for any-

Nikhil Kamath 31:30 One of them?

Kumar Birla 31:32 All three of them. Uh, I have a different equation with all three of them.

Nikhil Kamath 31:36 Right.

Kumar Birla 31:37 Um, they are all three very special kids. I'm sure every father thinks that, uh, about, uh, his kids. I definitely do about mine. But, um, you know, emotional availability, I think, has to be restricted to just a very few people.

Nikhil Kamath 31:54 Right.

Kumar Birla 31:55 Uh, it can damage you otherwise.

Nikhil Kamath 31:57 Right.

Kumar Birla 31:58 Um-

Nikhil Kamath 31:58 How many people do you think that should be?

Kumar Birla 32:01 In that, uh, the lucky five or six?

Nikhil Kamath 32:03 Mm.

Kumar Birla 32:04 I'd say six or seven.

Nikhil Kamath 32:05 Right.

Kumar Birla 32:06 Um, I wouldn't want to be emotionally available-

Nikhil Kamath 32:09 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 32:10 ... uh, to more than that. I mean, how would you-- Isn't that a very taxing thing?

Nikhil Kamath 32:17 It is, yeah. I don't think I'm very emotionally available. It's a big flaw of mine. Uh, I didn't... This is not a self-actualization thing where I realized it, but I've had multiple people tell me I'm emotionally available, and today I'm at that place where if more than two or three people tell me something, at some point I have to acknowledge it. Acknowledge it not outwardly, but to myself-

Kumar Birla 32:45 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 32:45 ... maybe there's something to it.

Kumar Birla 32:46 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 32:47 So I think I'm a fairly emotionally unavailable person.

Kumar Birla 32:50 What makes you like that?

Nikhil Kamath 32:52 Mm.

Kumar Birla 32:53 Actually, what's the problem in being like that?

Nikhil Kamath 32:56 Yeah, I feel like, uh, my hierarchy-- They say whatever is on top of your list of hierarchies that you believe in is God for you. I feel like my list of hierarchies might be slightly different from somebody aspiring to a very balanced life. I'm in that phase of life where balance is not the ultimate goal-

Kumar Birla 33:21 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 33:21 ... but, uh, maybe stupidly, I have my own little qualms and ambitions that give me short-term validation, and I chase them, and maybe that makes me emotionally unavailable.

Kumar Birla 33:35 You're saying that this is about work-life balance, or in what way do you mean that?

Nikhil Kamath 33:38 I feel like balance between everything, not just work and life outside of work-

Kumar Birla 33:44 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 33:44 ... but the philosophical definition of balance, I think, is a balance between self-actualization, spirituality, figuring out your place in the ecosystem, where the world is. Uh, I think it's much broader. I don't think I play any part in that, or I spend enough time dwelling on that. Even the work-life balance, I don't really have it.

Kumar Birla 34:10 Not right.

Nikhil Kamath 34:10 I'm working all the time. Yeah.

Kumar Birla 34:12 Yeah, and I don't think I can ever. I mean, I don't think I'm made like that.

Nikhil Kamath 34:16 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 34:18 Um-

Nikhil Kamath 34:18 But isn't that one of the things you wanted to change about your father?

Kumar Birla 34:21 My father?

Nikhil Kamath 34:22 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 34:23 No, not really.

Nikhil Kamath 34:24 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 34:24 I mean, why would you wanna change, uh, anything about anyone? I'm saying that today, when I'm, when I'm fifty-seven. I didn't feel that when I was at your age. But honestly, that... I, I mean, the only thing I can think of is, I wish he'd spent more time with us.

Nikhil Kamath 34:43 Right.

Kumar Birla 34:44 Uh, but after having been through that phase where you're intensely involved in, you know, growing your business-

Nikhil Kamath 34:51 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 34:52 ... uh, you're on a very steep learning curve-

Nikhil Kamath 34:55 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 34:55 ... I pretty much understand his predicament. Uh, you know, it is about how do you balance time between work and family. It's as simple as that. Uh, other than that, I don't think that, uh, I would have liked him to be, you know, different in any way. Um, yeah, well, I don't see why-- I... What did you, what would you have liked? I know it's still a little raw for you, but anything about your dad that you would have-

Nikhil Kamath 35:23 Mm

Kumar Birla 35:23 ... liked to be different?

Nikhil Kamath 35:25 Yeah, I feel like it is a bit raw 'cause it's not been a year yet, but I feel like he would-- I, I would wish for him to have been more transient in his belief systems, even more than he already was. Uh, like you said about-

Kumar Birla 35:45 Tell me now, that's, that's quite deep, Nikhil.

Nikhil Kamath 35:48 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 35:49 So in what way?

Nikhil Kamath 35:51 He was unwilling to change many of the belief systems that were inculcated in- into him very early, and I think he would have been a happier person if he had allowed for them to change. Like, I can, like, really go into this-

Kumar Birla 36:11 For example?

Nikhil Kamath 36:12 Even the construct of marriage-

Kumar Birla 36:15 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 36:16 ... or-... the traditional societal construct of marriage, I feel like another version of it might have made it better for him. I don't mean another person, but another version.

Kumar Birla 36:34 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 36:35 Uh, a lot of the things in life are not voluntary choices that we are making.

Kumar Birla 36:42 You-- they can't be.

Nikhil Kamath 36:43 Yeah. Reason in itself is not organic. I feel like the world tells us what is right or wrong, uh, and we conform more often than not, because not conforming is a lot more work than conforming.

Kumar Birla 37:02 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 37:02 And I think he did conform in many ways.

Kumar Birla 37:05 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 37:07 And I wish he kind of like questioned, not his choices, but societal norms more, so he could have made choices.

Kumar Birla 37:15 So would that have impacted your and your brother's life in a different way, or?

Nikhil Kamath 37:20 It might have, but I feel like-

Kumar Birla 37:22 You think he would have been a happier person? Is that what-

Nikhil Kamath 37:25 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 37:25 ... Is that the space you come from?

Nikhil Kamath 37:26 Yeah. I feel like we wrongly take the burden of responsibility for things that we actually don't control, but we think we can control. If each person finds what makes him happy-

Kumar Birla 37:43 Hmm

Nikhil Kamath 37:43 ... and he's true to that, I would suspect the other people who love him will be happier by virtue of that.

Kumar Birla 37:51 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 37:52 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 37:53 That's a deep one again.

Nikhil Kamath 37:55 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 37:56 Yeah. No, actually, when I think about,

Kumar Birla 38:00 about it, the only thing that made my, uh, dad worry about me was the fact that I didn't always conform.

Nikhil Kamath 38:06 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 38:07 Uh, and that sort of, you know, got him really worried, especially when it cames- came to airing my opinions about people, most, most, uh, often. Uh, he didn't think it was a good idea to have strong views, um, on people, uh, issues and situations, especially in the family or, uh, in a home context. Uh, and I was always very liberal with my views.

Nikhil Kamath 38:36 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 38:37 Um, that's just the DNA, I guess, that I've, uh, been born with. Uh, and he was always a little on the edge because of that, a little careful about, you know, what is he going to say next? And I wasn't particularly, uh, you know, uh, careful about who I'm saying s- saying something to. Uh, if I didn't agree with you, I could be pretty opinionated and come across as being, you know, uh, very apparent that I, I don't agree. Um, that could be a relative, that could be a guest, it could be a friend of the family's. That's something that he couldn't quite understand.

Nikhil Kamath 39:19 Right.

Kumar Birla 39:20 Conforming is, is something that it is a very sort of double-edged sword, right?

Nikhil Kamath 39:25 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 39:25 So you have to kind of strike a balance, I think. Uh, the pressure to perform or conform on your generation is much less than it was, uh, on us.

Nikhil Kamath 39:40 But to my generation-

Kumar Birla 39:40 Which I think is, uh, you know, huge.

Nikhil Kamath 39:43 Yeah. But I think my generation, being woke is also conforming to being woke.

Kumar Birla 39:49 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 39:50 I don't think anybody has thought deeply enough about the contrarian viewpoints of the prior generation that we are taking. We are woke today because it's cool to be woke.

Kumar Birla 40:02 So you're saying that being woke is not really, uh, rooted in, you know, actual belief about something, it's just about being cool and being... going with the tide?

Nikhil Kamath 40:15 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 40:16 That you will-- I think you'll always have a majority of people who are like that.

Nikhil Kamath 40:20 Hmm.

Kumar Birla 40:21 Uh, I mean, you know, that, that's something that's not going to change, not in your generation, not in the generation after that. But I think that, uh, not being able to conform-

Nikhil Kamath 40:32 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 40:32 ... in some ways, uh, it gives you more choices, right? I mean, it gives you, uh, more latitude in the choices you make about, say, career-

Nikhil Kamath 40:40 Yeah

Kumar Birla 40:40 ... uh, about so many things. Life is much easier when, uh, the need to conform is, you know, much lower.

Nikhil Kamath 40:50 Yeah. It's like wine. Every year of wine, a certain vintage of wine, has a certain characteristic. I feel like the mask of wokeness is my generation's characteristic.

Kumar Birla 41:06 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 41:06 And the default setting is the mask, and it's the easier setting, so nobody really has to question why we are woke.

Kumar Birla 41:14 Yeah, but I think that people, with people you, uh, interact with, you know, fairly closely, the mask will always fall.

Nikhil Kamath 41:21 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 41:21 If someone's advocating something just to be woke and not because they believe in it, you know, that mask always falls. And, you know, a lot of people, most people want to conform.

Nikhil Kamath 41:34 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 41:34 Uh, they want to be part of the crowd and swim with the tide. So that's, that's not, uh... I, I don't find that unusual.

Nikhil Kamath 41:43 Is there something that-

Kumar Birla 41:43 What are you woke about? [chuckles] You, you asked this-

Nikhil Kamath 41:46 What is the mask I've put on?

Kumar Birla 41:48 Not the mask. What are you actually woke about, deeply? If anything.

Nikhil Kamath 41:51 What do I, I really care about? I feel like a lot of successful people, like yourself, would have thought a certain thing at a certain point of time in life and voiced it.

Kumar Birla 42:07 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 42:08 It might be your family legacy, it might be the tenets of the Birla family. And, uh, with time, we buy into this philosophy so deeply that we lose all ability to tweak, nudge, change it-... uh, if people were allowed to change their minds more often without judgment, is something I think will help humans evolve faster. If I believed in something five years ago, and I changed-

Kumar Birla 42:43 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 42:43 ... my mind about it drastically today, the term society would give it is hypocrisy. Uh, the real term that should be attached to it, I think, is evolution. And, uh, we should be all more welcoming of people changing their viewpoints-

Kumar Birla 43:04 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 43:04 ... and where they stand in society about different things. I think it just speedens up the rate of evolution of society.

Kumar Birla 43:10 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 43:11 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 43:12 You know, I think that's a feeling that every generation feels, so if that makes you feel [chuckles] any better-

Nikhil Kamath 43:18 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 43:19 Uh, I, I've never been someone who's overly concerned about, uh, what people say. In fact, that's, uh... You know, I grew up being told that, you know, "Must be careful." Like, like I said, I was quite open about, quite strong, strong about my opinions on things and people. Uh, and my friends, my cousins would tell me that, "You don't seem to care about what other people are saying. Uh, look at what he's saying, what she..." It's just something that doesn't affect me.

Nikhil Kamath 43:49 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 43:50 It never has. Uh, you know, I mean, of course, one understands one's responsibilities and duties, and all of that. And as long as you're doing good with that, uh, other people's opinions have never mattered to me-

Nikhil Kamath 44:04 Yeah

Kumar Birla 44:05 ... other than, you know, my own inner circle. Not good or bad, or right or wrong, it's just the way I've been. And I think that has been very liberating for me.

Nikhil Kamath 44:14 Mm.

Kumar Birla 44:15 Uh, that takes a huge pressure off you. Um, and that comes from, you know, an inner conviction. It's not because I want to project that or, uh, want to be like that. It's just the way, you know, I've always been. Um, and I think that's worked to my advantage.

Nikhil Kamath 44:36 Why the conscious decision

Nikhil Kamath 44:38 to not speak publicly about what you're thinking? I, I think you barely have. Like I was saying, the last real interview I watched was 26 years ago. Why is that?

Kumar Birla 44:53 You know, I have pretty much consciously stayed away from the media.

Nikhil Kamath 44:56 Mm.

Kumar Birla 44:56 I don't think that my job, uh, requires me to be, uh, in people's faces all the time.

Nikhil Kamath 45:05 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 45:06 And personally, I'm, I'm a private person. I don't... I, I'm not very sort of keen on sharing, uh, things about my personal life or, uh, you know, I'd rather keep all of that, my personal thoughts to myself. Um, that's pretty much it. There's no, no other reason for that. I mean, you have platforms to, uh, express your opinions if you want to, right? Whether it's at work or-

Nikhil Kamath 45:33 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 45:33 ... whether it's with the government or whether it's your family.

Nikhil Kamath 45:36 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 45:37 And rather than speak about it to people at large, uh, through the media, you'd rather- I'd rather speak about it at an appropriate forum or an appropriate platform. It could be a d- dinner table conversation.

Nikhil Kamath 45:51 Mm.

Kumar Birla 45:52 So I've never really shied away from, like I said, from speaking my mind. If, uh, it's something that really matters to me or bothers me, uh, never worried about becoming unpopular on account of that or, you know, kind of rubbing someone the wrong way, if, if it comes from a place of conviction. But it doesn't have to be something that's known to the whole world. Uh, it's something that I think, uh, needs to be spoken of to the appropriate audience.

Nikhil Kamath 46:23 If you had zero fear-- Like, I'm scared of so many things, right? Like, I'm scared of, uh, judgment online. I'm scared, I'm scared of perception, government, regulator, this, that, the other, like a hundred different things. If you were scared of nothing-

Kumar Birla 46:41 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 46:42 ... and you had to say one thing that society needs to hear, but nobody is saying it, what would it be?

Kumar Birla 46:51 What would, what would it be for you? Give me an example.

Nikhil Kamath 46:53 I feel like men's mental health is as important, uh-

Kumar Birla 46:59 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 47:00 ... to society as anything else, and we should give it the place and weightage that it deserves.

Kumar Birla 47:06 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 47:07 Yeah. Your turn.

Kumar Birla 47:11 Yeah, no, I, I think that, um, you know, equality in terms of, uh, let's say there's a marriage.

Nikhil Kamath 47:18 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 47:19 Uh, you know, I've seen this so often, girl's side, boy's side, and the whole societal construct around that. What is expected of the boy's side, what is, uh, so much more expectation on the girl's side. That kind of equ- equality is something that I think we need to, uh, you know, strive to make, uh, a change, uh, with... It's mindset, mindsets. It's about, uh, it's tradition sometimes. Sometimes it's just the way people are. But I think that that's such an important role, uh, in our society. Uh, you know, it has so many good and bad consequences. Uh, it would be good for people to speak about that, create awareness around that.

Nikhil Kamath 48:12 Fair.

Kumar Birla 48:12 You know, for example, for a lot of parents, uh, boy's parents asking for- daughter's parents, boy's parents asking for dowry is something that's quite normal.

Nikhil Kamath 48:25 Mm.

Kumar Birla 48:25 Uh, they say, "You know, ऐसा तो होता है"... kya isme kya hai? I mean, what's wrong with it? Some of these, I think, require radical change, and someone has to start to talk about them and create awareness. Uh, that's something that I, I feel quite strongly about because I just think that, you know, there are so many people who, uh, are indebted for their whole life because they spend so much on getting their daughter married. Not in our society, but in a lot of societies that we won't even imagine, uh, you know, things like, uh, this happening. That kind of thing, uh, makes me feel, uh, like it needs to be talked about, uh, by opinion makers, mindsets changed. Long process, but that's something that would, uh, bother me. Interesting, it, it shapes-

Nikhil Kamath 49:19 Mm.

Kumar Birla 49:20 -that's how, uh, you know, society at that level gets shaped. That's how family units, uh, get shaped. I remember just, just a few days ago, uh, we run this scholarship in my father's name.

Nikhil Kamath 49:34 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 49:35 Uh, and, uh, it was our twenty-fifth year, and some of the scholars, uh, who've been scholars over the years were talking about it. One girl said, "I come from a very, uh, conservative family. We didn't have, uh, finances to educate both me and my brother."

Nikhil Kamath 49:50 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 49:51 "My, my, uh, parents obviously chose to educate my brother-

Nikhil Kamath 49:56 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 49:57 - and were it not for this scholarship, I don't think I would have had, uh, a reasonable quality of education." That's, that's... You see the, you know, inequality there. Um, that is something that bothers me.

Nikhil Kamath 50:10 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 50:10 Uh, it's, it's, uh, very deep-rooted and, um, but, you know, one must create awareness about it.

Nikhil Kamath 50:18 What is legacy to you?

Kumar Birla 50:22 Well, that's a big one. Legacy to me is more about impact, uh, not so much about, uh, accolades. It's about the impact you've had on people, on society. In, in a case, like, say, in, in the case of our family, it's more about impact through business. Um, I think that's what creates, uh, legacy, the way you connect with people, the way you give back to society, whether it impacts lives, families in a direct way. That is, uh, legacy to me. Uh, that's how we think of legacy. I mean, that's what, um, any of us, I think, in the family would think of, uh, when one talks of legacy.

Nikhil Kamath 51:12 Do you think generosity is a magnet for power?

Kumar Birla 51:17 You know, in a-- Are you saying in a corporate? In a corporate context, giving back is not generosity. I think it's just something that, uh... Look, you're taking from society and generating a profit, right?

Nikhil Kamath 51:28 Right.

Kumar Birla 51:29 So giving a part of that back to society is something that, for me and for all of us, is a given. Is not a big, big deal. I mean, it's something that you ought to be doing in the first place, in any case.

Nikhil Kamath 51:41 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 51:42 And why make such a big deal out of it?

Nikhil Kamath 51:43 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 51:44 Uh, it's almost a responsibility. You know, a- as we, as I look ahead, uh, globally, I think maybe after the church in some parts of the world, or the government, of course, uh, everywhere in the world, uh, corporates are going to be one of the most important stakeholders-

Nikhil Kamath 52:06 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 52:06 ... globally-

Nikhil Kamath 52:07 Yeah

Kumar Birla 52:07 -in every, every part of the world, practically. So that comes with the inherent, uh-

Nikhil Kamath 52:13 Would you say that-

Kumar Birla 52:14 -responsibility.

Nikhil Kamath 52:15 Would you say that order is state, church, corporates? Church, I'm adding, like, all religions.

Kumar Birla 52:20 Um, I, I think even if that were to be the case, I mean, that's always up for debate, but the point remains that corporates still are a very important and a growing, uh, part of society, and the expectation or the desire to give back is a responsibility, and it's not really something that, uh, unusual or something that's altruistic. I mean, it's just something that should be done, uh, because you're just giving back to society from which the business... Forget about the individual part of it, that of course, also. But when you're getting so much, uh, for business to play a role in impacting society positively, is just part of a charter of business. I don't think that it needs to be, uh, called out as philanthropy necessarily. Uh, that, that's how we would view it, which is why also we wouldn't talk about it, not for any other reason. But, you know, a lot of people, uh, have asked, uh, as to why there's no documentation on the work the family has done over the years, over generations. Um, and I did ask this to some of the family elders a few years ago, and obviously, no one was interested in doing that. Um, I don't think there's anyone in the family today who knows about all the charities that have been done over the years in terms of contribution, you know, community asset building. Uh, and I, I think it would be great documentary, just as an archival thing for the family, for our children and grandchildren. Obviously, no one in the family, other than me, believes there's merit to doing that-

Nikhil Kamath 54:08 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 54:09 ... uh, which is quite telling, actually.

Nikhil Kamath 54:11 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 54:12 Uh, but there is no one who knows about everything that's been done in terms of giving back, uh, through the generations. There are so many things you hear about. Go on a plant visit, and there'll be people who will come and say that, "... aapki, aapke parivar ki banayi hui hai.

Nikhil Kamath 54:34 Right.

Kumar Birla 54:35 And if I ask the family elders, none of them would sort of-

Nikhil Kamath 54:39 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 54:40 -sometimes even know about it.

Nikhil Kamath 54:42 Right.

Kumar Birla 54:43 So, I mean, it's a different way of giving. It's, it's what some people would call gupt, yeah, uh, dan.

Nikhil Kamath 54:51 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 54:51 Gupt dan, which means it's really something that, you know, doesn't need to be talked about or revealed, so to speak. Uh, it's just in the normal course of business, normal course of life.

Nikhil Kamath 55:06 Your family had a very interesting

Nikhil Kamath 55:08 past with Mahatma Gandhi. Can you tell us more about that? He's such a enigmatic figure in our own country's history, but, uh, not enough is spoken about him today, maybe. And, uh, if you had-- if you have any stories, any, like, interesting things that happened. He lived in your house in the last part of his life as well, right?

Kumar Birla 55:34 I mean, this was well before I was born- [chuckles] ... Nikhil.

Nikhil Kamath 55:37 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 55:38 Um, but, you know, essentially, uh, there is this socioeconomic concept of trusteeship, which my great-grandfather, having spent so much of time with him and being a, a close associate, came to embrace.

Nikhil Kamath 55:53 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 55:53 Which is that, you know, private, uh, p- companies in the private sector, so to speak, are more, um, uh... It's more about collective prosperity as opposed to emblems of capitalism. Uh, again, it comes back to the same topic that we were talking about, philanthropy. It's not about philanthropy, it's about giving back. That concept of trusteeship, uh, has just percolated down, uh, the generations. Of course, one has heard about, uh, the time when he stayed in our family home, uh, the day that he was shot-

Nikhil Kamath 56:26 Yeah

Kumar Birla 56:27 ... and, you know, what happened after that, where people were. My grandmother remembered clearly where she was when this happened, and how they all went rushing down and, you know, uh, all, all the events that kind of happened after that. Uh, but I think the Gandhian way of living, there is still an element of that, uh, that exists. Um, so for example, you know, we, we would do a ten-minute puja for Diwali, ten-minute puja for Holi.

Nikhil Kamath 57:00 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 57:01 Uh, I used to ask my, you know, my parents, "Well, why is it that we don't celebrate?" "So you celebrate if you want to, there's no harm, but we don't believe in this, uh, thing of, uh, uh, you know, uh, spending too much time, uh, on, uh, rituals," for example, a small thing. Uh, so there are, there are sort of strong pieces of that legacy that also remain, uh, which I find quite endearing, actually. Uh, obviously, much less than before. I mean, [clears throat] I remember, uh, my grandparents telling me, my grandaunts, how they, uh, lit a bonfire at the back of the house during the freedom movement, and they all sort of, you know, uh, burned their clothes that they had, that were imported-

Nikhil Kamath 57:54 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 57:54 -and started to wear khadi. Obviously, it doesn't-- that passion doesn't sort of obviously stay the way it was at that point in time.

Nikhil Kamath 58:02 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 58:04 But I think that there are elements of that, uh, philosophy or that way of life, way of thinking, uh, that still, you know, come up every now and then, uh, within the family, and I think we're so fortunate for that.

Nikhil Kamath 58:22 Any, like... If you were to describe him in three words, just the individual, not the public persona of all that we know about him. From a story that has been foretold in the family or has come down generations, how would you describe the man?

Kumar Birla 58:40 Mahatma Gandhi? That's a tough one. Um, liberal, I think.

Nikhil Kamath 58:47 Hmm?

Kumar Birla 58:48 Uh, yeah, I mean, I think he, the influence he, in, that he had, uh, on my great-grandfather, therefore on my family, would indicate to me that he wasn't one to be overly sort of, uh, cowed down by societal norms.

Nikhil Kamath 59:05 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 59:06 Uh, quite liberal in the way he thought. Uh, and, and that influence was something that rubbed off.

Nikhil Kamath 59:13 Anything else about him?

Kumar Birla 59:17 Not really, Nikhil. I mean, um, when you go to our family house, which is now, of course, uh, owned by the government, you'll see that, uh, it was, uh... You know, if you see, uh, his room, his chashma, book, you know, like a sort of a bed. Obviously, he believed in, uh, simplicity.

Nikhil Kamath 59:42 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 59:43 Uh, not, uh, accumulating for himself at all. Obviously, that's something that everyone knows about him. Uh, but, uh, yeah, I think he was quite liberal in his thoughts in many ways.

Nikhil Kamath 59:58 If we were to go back to the innate nature of human beings, and we say there is no such thing as true altruism, everybody gets some kind of a high. For the ones who don't get it from capitalism, it might be from being a contrarian, it might be a moralistic high, it might be that philanthropy s- gives somebody a high. Would you agree with that concept, that we are all chasing a high which only we can define for ourselves?

Kumar Birla 1:00:33 Give me an example.

Nikhil Kamath 1:00:35 Like, if I were to find a person who does not believe in accumulating money-... uh, somebody who, I, I don't wanna take the example of somebody who's not alive anymore, but somebody who's alive, who has dedicated his life to philanthropy, for example. Do you think that is appeasing his, his morality in such a way that it is giving a high which might be bigger than the high of capitalism even? 'Cause it's rarer in today's capitalist society.

Kumar Birla 1:01:08 Could well be. I mean, it's-- I, I guess it's a case-to-case situation, can't generalize. Uh, but if one has spent his or her life, uh, you know, uh, being philanthropic, chances are that they truly believe in that, which is why they lived a, a life, uh, that they chose to live. Even if there is some element of making you feel, uh, you know, like a high if you're supporting people, you know, in whatever way that you are, I think that's fair. I mean, how does that matter? That's, that's just the human mind.

Nikhil Kamath 1:01:45 Fair. We'll go back to your high school. We went up until then, in Bombay.

Kumar Birla 1:01:50 Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:01:50 Uh, so 10 standard ICSE exams. Did well?

Kumar Birla 1:01:55 Very well, yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:01:57 And then college was?

Kumar Birla 1:02:00 Well, I went to junior college, uh, in, uh, Sydenham.

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:03 Okay.

Kumar Birla 1:02:03 Um, uh, later in HR, I had started to study for my CA.

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:09 Uh-huh.

Kumar Birla 1:02:10 Uh, even during the ICSE break. Um, so I was studying for my CA alongside my graduation. Uh, I, I actually became a CA six months after graduating.

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:25 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:02:26 Uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:27 Which is quite hard.

Kumar Birla 1:02:28 Which is very hard.

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:29 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:02:30 Uh, not something that I enjoyed at all. I mean, that was a tough, tough phase of life, because when your fr- friends were having a relatively good time-

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:40 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:02:41 ... you had to work pretty hard.

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:42 Right.

Kumar Birla 1:02:43 Uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:45 And what was the driving factor to put in that work?

Kumar Birla 1:02:47 So my-

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:48 'Cause you didn't have to.

Kumar Birla 1:02:49 I didn't want to do a CA at all. I thought it was very dry, very boring.

Nikhil Kamath 1:02:53 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:02:53 It's a very tough... It used to be, I mean, the pass percentage was, I think, two or three percent when I gave it. So you can imagine the kind of stress-

Nikhil Kamath 1:03:02 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:03:03 ... uh, it causes.

Nikhil Kamath 1:03:05 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:03:05 And I wasn't the kind of person who would get into it and not get out of it, uh, successfully.

Nikhil Kamath 1:03:12 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:03:12 Not the kind of person who would drop things midway.

Nikhil Kamath 1:03:16 Was that the weight of expectations and lineage, or was that coming from inside?

Kumar Birla 1:03:22 It was just something my, my father was convinced that I needed to do a CA and an MBA.

Nikhil Kamath 1:03:28 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:03:29 Uh, he pretty much, uh, you know, set the agenda for my professional life at that time, which I think was fair because he had a very good understanding of [clears throat] me, my strengths, my weaknesses, what my, you know, likely, uh, work that I would do in the future would entail in terms of skill sets. Uh, so essentially, uh, he just said to me that, "If you're not going to be a CA, MBA, you can't come and work in our office. There's no role that I can, uh, give to you." And, you know, I, I just saw all my ambitions-

Nikhil Kamath 1:04:05 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:04:05 ... fly out of the window, right?

Nikhil Kamath 1:04:06 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:04:07 Because all the ambitions or whatever I had in terms of wanting to do things, uh, create things, were all r- related to business.

Nikhil Kamath 1:04:16 Right.

Kumar Birla 1:04:16 That was my biggest exposure. I think that, uh, at our time, they used fear as a motivator every now and then-

Nikhil Kamath 1:04:24 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:04:25 ... which, um, I kind of understand now. I didn't understand then.

Nikhil Kamath 1:04:29 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:04:29 But I figured quite easily that, uh, quite quickly, that this was really something that I would have to do.

Nikhil Kamath 1:04:36 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:04:37 Um, I didn't have a choice, so it was a painful three or four, four or five years. I just did it because I knew that that was my ticket to some of the things that I wanted to do in the future.

Nikhil Kamath 1:04:50 Mm-hmm. Do you think fear is a significantly larger, more powerful motivator than love, for example?

Kumar Birla 1:05:01 I do.

Nikhil Kamath 1:05:01 I think Machiavelli says this. Uh, Machiavelli is like, I don't know, like Italian Chanakya maybe, if you were to, like, draw down an Indian analogy. But when he was advising the Medicis and the Roman and the Florentine emperors of the time, he always said that, "As a leader, depict or influence fear among people is a far-- will have a far longer tenure of rule, successful tenure of rule, than if you were to show love to people. 'Cause fear can be controlled, and love cannot."

Kumar Birla 1:05:42 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:05:43 What do you think about that?

Kumar Birla 1:05:45 I, I don't believe in that. I think fear is something that... For example, I wouldn't want my children to be fearful of anything.

Nikhil Kamath 1:05:53 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:05:54 Unless they're doing something that's incorrect or, uh, unethical, which is not gonna happen, just knowing the way they are. I don't think they, they need to be fearful. Why fear, I mean? Fear is something that can really, uh, you know, quash you as, as a personality. Why would you-- It's also a very different context, right? I'm talking about, uh, I was 22, so that's about 35 years ago. Uh, parenting was, uh, a very different thing then, clearly. Uh, in today's context, I don't think that fear should have a role. I don't think it can have any kind of positive role to play in one's life.

Nikhil Kamath 1:06:38 You have a very kind way of explaining things. I read somewhere or someone said that you never lose your cool. You've lost it only twice.

Kumar Birla 1:06:48 ... I've lost it eighteen times in thirty, twenty-nine years. And the reason I, um, I remember this [chuckles] number so specifically is that it- I- to me, it's a black mark if you're losing your cool, especially at work. You know, you, you're blessed to have so many colleagues who-

Nikhil Kamath 1:07:07 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:07:08 ... uh, who put in so much of, uh, their emotional, intellectual equity, their time. Then for me to have to lose my cool is, is really a, uh, not a very good commentary on me as a leader. Uh, therefore, I've kept a count of it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:07:25 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:07:26 Having said that, you know, sometimes, uh, it's important to be angry. I mean, that's, that's for the better. You need to be angry-

Nikhil Kamath 1:07:32 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:07:33 ... just to, uh, you know, express a point of view that otherwise is sort of not going through or not getting registered as strongly as, as required. But, um, yeah, I, I think that, uh, uh, I'm a much, uh, easier person today than I was maybe even ten years ago. Um, even personally, um, uh, I'm, I'm much less likely to lose my cool-

Nikhil Kamath 1:08:05 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:08:06 ... uh, or lose my shirt over something. The chances of me just walking away from the situation are much higher.

Nikhil Kamath 1:08:12 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:08:13 Uh, I, I think that's just, uh, learning from life. It's also a lot of spirituality that you touched upon some time back. Um, I just think that getting angry is, unless it's something that, you know, and it depends on what. I'm saying in the, in the context of work, uh, having to get angry is, uh, it shouldn't happen very often. Uh, for me, it's not happened very often, and it's worked. There are tough comp- con- conversations that you, that you need to have.

Nikhil Kamath 1:08:52 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:08:53 And I've had several tough conversations on a one-to-one or with small teams. That's very different from getting angry.

Nikhil Kamath 1:09:02 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:09:02 Um, getting angry in some way, let's say, in a corporate context, it's also a little bit about getting out of control, almost-

Nikhil Kamath 1:09:11 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:09:11 ... in my mind. Uh, and therefore, not a very good thing, the way I see it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:09:20 Are you somebody who-

Kumar Birla 1:09:20 You look like a very soft person and not someone who's gonna get, uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:09:23 I never get angry.

Kumar Birla 1:09:24 Angry, yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:09:25 I can't remember the last time-

Kumar Birla 1:09:27 How do you do that?

Nikhil Kamath 1:09:29 Uh, I feel like my, how I arrived at not getting angry is, uh, a lot weaker than it is for you. I grew up around confrontation, and I don't get angry because I want to avoid confrontation that comes with the anger. So-

Kumar Birla 1:09:50 Well, that's fair. I think that's a mature way to look at it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:09:53 Yeah. So I'm actually escaping confrontation, and you're likely very right, that sometimes one has to be angry. But because I'm incapable of being angry, I'm somebody who's more, again, a weakness of mine, but passive-aggressive. I would much rather ignore a person than confront the person, which would have led for me to need to have been angry.

Kumar Birla 1:10:20 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:10:20 I don't cry much as well. Like, I can count on my fingers how many times I've cried in the last decade. Dad-

Kumar Birla 1:10:27 How, how would the two be connected?

Nikhil Kamath 1:10:30 Uh, I feel like extreme emotion on one side is succumbing to the moment. The other side, anger, is, I think, trying to engulf the moment. Uh, so on those two extreme, extremes of that pendulum, I rarely go. Like I said, five times. I remember brother's stroke, dad, dog passing away, maybe one breakup, and I can't even remember the fifth, in the last decade. [chuckles]

Kumar Birla 1:11:06 That's quite something. That's unusual.

Nikhil Kamath 1:11:08 Yeah. Yeah, it is.

Kumar Birla 1:11:11 So you're, you're very controlled then, controlled in your emotions?

Nikhil Kamath 1:11:15 Fairly controlled, yeah. To the extent that people have called me emotionally dead. People who should not be calling me emotionally dead, if you know what I mean. [chuckles]

Kumar Birla 1:11:23 Is that worrying to you, or...?

Nikhil Kamath 1:11:25 It's not-

Kumar Birla 1:11:26 It's done in a way that it is done by design?

Nikhil Kamath 1:11:29 No, no, it's not design. It's just, uh, circumstance. I use the excuse of work. I tell myself that I've been an investor, trader, for twenty-one years of my life. I started at seventeen, I'm thirty-eight today. And there, I do well by virtue of being non-emotional and not reacting, not emoting to something. So-

Kumar Birla 1:12:00 In work or even personally?

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:02 Even personally, yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:12:03 So you've trained yourself to be like that?

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:05 Yeah, I think so. Also, that's a very convenient excuse to me, for me. Yeah, so I use it.

Kumar Birla 1:12:13 Excuse for what?

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:15 Excuse for when somebody comes asking, "Why are you emotionally like this?"

Kumar Birla 1:12:21 Hmm. You say that my work demands me to be like this.

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:25 Yeah-

Kumar Birla 1:12:25 That, uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:25 ... I say that maybe my work has made me like this. I do get sad.

Kumar Birla 1:12:30 Could well be, right?

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:31 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:12:31 I mean, the work we do does shape us to an extent.

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:35 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:12:35 So that's probably also a genuine reason.

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:38 I'm sure the work you do has shaped you. I mean, your work is a hundred times bigger than my work. I think the nuances of it would have shaped your personality in so many ways. The-... stresses of your life, which led you to being the way you are today, only you will know, no?

Kumar Birla 1:12:54 Right.

Nikhil Kamath 1:12:54 And I'm guessing you must have so many. How many people work under the umbrella now?

Kumar Birla 1:13:02 So, uh, across the group, we have 180,000 people.

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:06 That's like a country.

Kumar Birla 1:13:09 Yeah, but it's, it's one team, and that's the way we look at it-

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:12 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:13:12 -which it truly is.

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:13 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:13:14 Uh, common-- I mean, with a common purpose in some ways, everyone's pulling in the same direction, and that's a very, you know, energizing kind of a environment to be in.

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:27 Okay, so we went to college. You became-- you were a very precocious young man who did chartered accountancy much faster than should be humanly possible.

Kumar Birla 1:13:39 [chuckles] Say that again.

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:42 [chuckles] Six months faster than, what was the timeframe you said?

Kumar Birla 1:13:47 No, I was saying that I-

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:48 [chuckles]

Kumar Birla 1:13:48 -completed my CA within six months of graduating.

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:51 Wow!

Kumar Birla 1:13:53 Which, uh, yeah, which-

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:55 So-

Kumar Birla 1:13:55 -was a tough one.

Nikhil Kamath 1:13:56 What was the proficiency there? Mathematics, was it?

Kumar Birla 1:14:01 I think the proficiency was just to be able to absorb a lot of things and retain that and, you know, kind of reproduce it-

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:10 Memory?

Kumar Birla 1:14:10 ... in an exam. Of course, memory, but it also is about just sheer volume-

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:15 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:14:16 -and how well you retain that and understand that. Uh, that, that, of course, was the interesting part of it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:27 Is it like that even today? Are you able to retain inordinate amount of information?

Kumar Birla 1:14:32 Yeah. Less than before, but, uh, that's also part of my job-

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:38 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:14:38 ... since we're in so many different-

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:40 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:14:41 -businesses. So I've trained myself a little bit, little bit to, to be like that also.

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:47 So after CA, next, what

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:49 happened?

Kumar Birla 1:14:50 I mean, I got married, worked for, for my father. I was also working with my father whilst doing my CA.

Nikhil Kamath 1:14:56 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:14:57 Um, which meant just sitting next to him.

Nikhil Kamath 1:15:01 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:15:01 Uh, it was like a real-time MBA.

Nikhil Kamath 1:15:05 Which part of the business?

Kumar Birla 1:15:07 So he had by then been detected with cancer, and in retrospect, I think he kind of, uh, re-pivoted the training, uh, program that he had for me after that. Made it quite smooth for me, but, uh, he just wanted me to be with him through the day, you know, sit through meetings, be in different situations. Um, all kinds of businesses, even then, in the sense, some that were doing well, some that weren't doing well. Just to give me a sense of, uh, uh, you know, different businesses across the group, a more pan-group kind of, uh, exposure, which meant that, uh, I sat with him for eight, nine hours every day. Uh, quite tough, but I could see very quickly that there's lots to be learnt here, uh, in real time.

Nikhil Kamath 1:16:04 What era was this? Which year?

Kumar Birla 1:16:08 So this would be, uh... You know, as part of your CA, you can intern with a company.

Nikhil Kamath 1:16:15 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:16:16 And I chose to obviously do that with our company. So this was probably when I was 18.

Nikhil Kamath 1:16:23 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:16:24 So '85, I guess. Uh, it was an interesting time. I mean, very different time from now, again. And I remember that-- I remember my mother, he used to complain to my mother quite often that, "I don't think Kumar pays attention."

Nikhil Kamath 1:16:44 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:16:45 And I used to tell her, "You know, I'm sitting right under his nose, literally." I mean, I, I, I could almost be on his lap. Uh, and why on Earth would I not pay attention? I mean, and so this went on for, for a while, three or four times. Then eventually, I told her: "You know, we must ask him to stop and ask me-

Nikhil Kamath 1:17:06 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:17:06 ... about what's happening or my views or something about what's being discussed, because that's the only way that he will know whether I'm paying attention or not." So he started to do that, and fortunately, I obviously was paying attention and absorbing every bit of it. I kind of gave the impression that I was, uh, not being focused for some reason. Um, but strangely, that changed my equation with him at work. You know, he suddenly started-- He said to me: "How is it that I thought you don't sort of pay attention, but you simply not seem to know pretty much what's happening. You absorb very fast." And so I said: "You know, I'm almost a CA. I'm gonna be a CA in one year, so obviously-

Nikhil Kamath 1:17:55 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:17:55 ... there has to be some advantage to that." Uh, that kind of was very reassuring to him. You know, he just said that, "I, I just feel that I had no idea that you, uh, learn so quickly," and which was a huge thing for me at that point in my career, where my father was this huge, almost like a monster, the first year that I worked with him. Um, so that, that was a huge shot in the arm. I think completing my CA, uh, was a big thing for me. I-- The last six months, uh, I got a job offer at every company that I went to for, for an audit.

Nikhil Kamath 1:18:35 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:18:36 They just knew me as Kumar, and, uh, you know, uh, that was reassuring. My father got-- started to get a little worried, I thought.

Nikhil Kamath 1:18:45 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:18:46 Uh, you know, sort of like a way, but-... all of those things were positive, uh, you know, positive signals to me. I grew in my confidence because of that. College, uh, I couldn't really get to because I was either-- for, for two years, I was auditing the whole day-

Nikhil Kamath 1:19:06 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:19:07 -part of the CA. So every, every CA charter and every end of every term, I'd be outside the staff room and blacklisted, and, "Call your parents," and all of that. I said, "I'm doing my CA. I told that to you when I took admission. I'm not-- there's no way I'm calling my parents. If you really, really want, want me to do that, you give me my TC-

Nikhil Kamath 1:19:27 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:19:27 -and I'm out of here." TC is transfer certificate.

Nikhil Kamath 1:19:30 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:19:31 Uh, so this drama went on almost for three years, unfortunately.

Nikhil Kamath 1:19:35 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:19:36 Uh, they also kept saying that, "We want to have you because, you know, it's such a matter of pride that one of our students is going to complete his CA along with graduation." But they also gave me this sort of, uh, tough deal after every, uh, uh, kind of term. Uh, my father wanted me to attend work and be with him, so it was quite a, you know... At, at the same time, I was auditing outside firms, you know, every now and then. I remember three, three months, four months of going by train, uh, to Kandivali for an audit. So life, there was lots of things happening, um, quite overwhelming.

Nikhil Kamath 1:20:15 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:20:16 Uh, but, you know, um, I had a deep sense that this is all going to work well for me.

Nikhil Kamath 1:20:21 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:20:22 So I'd kind of given up, uh, with my dad on the professional front.

Nikhil Kamath 1:20:27 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:20:27 I'd figured that, you know, he has it sorted out and thought out much better than I could have ever done.

Nikhil Kamath 1:20:34 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:20:35 So let me just follow what he said, however tough-

Nikhil Kamath 1:20:38 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:20:38 ... it might be, and it was very tough. But I'm so grateful, uh, for that in retrospect, because as things turned out, he passed away very early, and I had a lot of responsibilities to take care of. Uh, but yeah, interesting time, um, but very tough. Lot of hard work, uh, and I don't think I've looked back in the sense that, uh, I think I've worked hard pretty much every day since then. Uh, other than when I'm on holiday, I think that's pretty much of, uh, a sort of bulwark of the, the kind of person I am. I've seen that growing up. I had three generations before me going to work every day, intensely involved, father and grandfather and great-grandfather. And a- after that first initial years, uh, just after I graduated and my CA, I think something that, uh, has stayed with me is, uh, the work, the fact that there really is no substitute for hard work, for smart, hard work. Uh, and I think that's a work ethic that I picked up from, uh, my family, and I feel very grateful to that, for that. Um, yeah, so it was a defining period of time for me.

Nikhil Kamath 1:21:55 How was it

Nikhil Kamath 1:21:56 back then? Um, I'm picturing '85, '86, pre-liberal India. You, a eighteen-year-old man, going to work with his father. Like, paint a picture of your day back then. Where was office? What was the scale of office? What did it mean when you g- when you go to work, how did the employees of the office look at you? Can you throw some light? I'm just trying to put a picture to it.

Kumar Birla 1:22:27 Hmm. So, um, I was like an intern, other than the fact that I was the owner's son.

Nikhil Kamath 1:22:33 Hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:22:34 Uh, so I had the opportunity and privilege to sit right next to him. Uh, and, uh, like I said, it was like a real-time MBA because-

Nikhil Kamath 1:22:43 Hmm

Kumar Birla 1:22:43 ... you know, I, I saw him handling tough situations. I saw him conduct an AGM. I saw him firing someone. I saw him hiring some good people, uh, you know, attend to government issues. That kind of exposure is something that you'd get over a period of time-

Nikhil Kamath 1:23:01 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:23:01 ... in your career. So this was actually quite encapsulated because I think he knew somewhere that he, he was running out of time.

Nikhil Kamath 1:23:10 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:23:10 And therefore, he created this kind of, uh, encapsulated module for me-

Nikhil Kamath 1:23:16 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:23:16 ... to learn the different aspects of running a business. Uh, so I was growing, uh, personally, professionally. It was a time of stress. Uh, you know, I, I, I think very few would be able to take that kind of pressure. But, you know, like I said, uh, I knew deep down that despite all the pain, it was well worth it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:23:37 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:23:38 Uh, I was learning. I was in a very steep, uh, learning curve. Uh, I couldn't have learned all of that sitting in college. Um, I also worked for a year, uh, on the shop floor in a textile mill, which was quite fascinating. I wanted to understand about controls, financial controls, how manufacturing works, how-

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:01 Hmm

Kumar Birla 1:24:02 ... uh, you know, how, uh, you run a manufacturing business.

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:07 Right.

Kumar Birla 1:24:08 Um-

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:08 This was at Grasim?

Kumar Birla 1:24:10 This was at Century Textiles, that my grandfather-

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:14 Right

Kumar Birla 1:24:14 ... owned and, and ran-

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:16 Right

Kumar Birla 1:24:16 ... at the time. Now we've come to, Nikhil, when I'm last year of college, so I'm twenty-two, twenty-three-

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:27 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:24:27 ... twenty, twenty-

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:28 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:24:28 ... years of age.

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:29 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:24:30 Uh, so that's a lot of stuff happening-

Nikhil Kamath 1:24:33 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:24:33 ... for a twenty-year-old. A lot of my friends had, uh, you know, I mean, they didn't, uh, they weren't pushed, um, the out- the way I was being pushed, so they had a lot of free time. They were, uh, having a good time generally, and that did pinch you at times, but they were very accommodating and, you know, adjusted things to-... so that I could be a part of it. Uh, yeah, so it was quite painful, but huge, uh, uh, learning opportunity in some ways.

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:10 Do you have friends from back in the day who are still friends?

Kumar Birla 1:25:13 Oh, of course. I have three friends

Kumar Birla 1:25:15 from back in the day who I'm in touch with on a regular basis. Uh, and thank God for that because they're such a huge support, uh, each in their own way.

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:24 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:25:25 Um, you can be-

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:27 Would you like to name them?

Kumar Birla 1:25:27 ... pretty much yourself. I mean, they're not people who I've known, they're friends from school and college.

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:32 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:25:33 Um-

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:33 You can give them a shout-out. [laughing]

Kumar Birla 1:25:36 [laughing] They know exactly, uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:38 Who they are?

Kumar Birla 1:25:38 - that I'm talking about them.

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:39 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:25:41 Um, so yeah, and that, that's a very important part of, uh, you know, just having tra-- casual friendships-

Nikhil Kamath 1:25:48 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:25:49 ... from your school and, uh, college days, no strings attached. Uh, complete honesty, you know, fight sometime, disagree vehemently with each other. We don't discuss work. Uh, not their work, not my work. It's all about everything other than work.

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:10 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:26:10 But we've been through a lot of ups and down- downs in life together-

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:14 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:26:14 ... uh, which obviously makes, uh, bonds much closer. I think it's very important having friends, uh, where it's a friendship that's not really seeking anything.

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:25 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:26:26 Uh, makes life, uh, that much richer.

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:30 Please.

Kumar Birla 1:26:32 What about you?

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:33 I'm gonna have to... [cutlery clinking] What do we start with?

Kumar Birla 1:26:39 I

Kumar Birla 1:26:40 have my favorite sabji here, which is bhindi.

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:43 Yeah?

Kumar Birla 1:26:43 And I can, I can go for days on end with having just bhindi and paneer.

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:48 Really?

Kumar Birla 1:26:49 Uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:49 What is like a typical day of food for you?

Kumar Birla 1:26:53 I have, uh, small meals spread out through the day.

Nikhil Kamath 1:26:57 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:26:58 I'm, uh, not someone who loves food. It's more eat to live kind of a thing.

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:04 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:27:05 Uh, chocolate is something that... You know, I have a sweet tooth, especially with chocolate.

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:12 Favorite chocolate?

Kumar Birla 1:27:14 Keeps changing. I mean, it's-

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:16 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:27:16 ... there's nothing-

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:17 Right now, something-

Kumar Birla 1:27:18 Anything, pr- pretty-- practically anything. These cravings happen-

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:22 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:27:22 ... after dinner.

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:23 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:27:24 Uh, so you almost start to feel like the workout I did didn't, wasn't worth it because everything burnt up in calories. Yeah, but I'm a, I'm a pretty frugal eater. Uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:36 Yeah?

Kumar Birla 1:27:37 Yeah, not, not too fussy about it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:39 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:27:39 What about you?

Nikhil Kamath 1:27:41 Uh, so I like more protein, fiber, less carb kind of food. Today, I, I burnt the top part of my mouth 'cause my cook was getting engaged this morning, and he was on holiday. So I made this particular dish, which I make whenever I have to cook.

Kumar Birla 1:28:05 South Indian dish?

Nikhil Kamath 1:28:07 No, it's like boiled rice with vegetables and chicken and no masala. Very simple. It's one pot.

Kumar Birla 1:28:12 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:28:12 You put some chicken, you put some vegetables, you put some rice, you maybe add like some pepper and a couple of spices, and you just eat it. It's really clean food.

Kumar Birla 1:28:24 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:28:24 Makes you feel, like, great after eating it. [chuckles] Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:28:30 So it's got p- proteins and carbs, both.

Nikhil Kamath 1:28:32 Mm. And no masala or oil or anything like that.

Kumar Birla 1:28:38 Mm. So you burnt... You had it whilst it was too hot?

Nikhil Kamath 1:28:44 Yeah. I ate it off the stove, trying to taste if it's good, and I burned not my tongue, but the upper part of my mouth.

Kumar Birla 1:28:56 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:28:59 So bhindi and paneer for dinner, and breakfast is?

Kumar Birla 1:29:03 Breakfast is a two-egg omelet-

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:06 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:29:06 ... um, followed by a soup, sometime around twelve o'clock. Lunch, uh, so it's pretty simple.

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:16 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:29:17 I think it's best to keep food simple.

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:19 Mm. Mm, meals by yourself?

Kumar Birla 1:29:28 Mm, I, I reach home pretty late after work and workout.

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:33 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:29:35 So everyone else has eaten by then.

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:37 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:29:39 But, you know, all of us are around, so-

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:42 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:29:42 ... I'm eating by myself, but the family is around.

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:46 Are you a late-

Kumar Birla 1:29:46 It's unlike the way it was at our time, when everyone ate together. Can't be like that.

Nikhil Kamath 1:29:52 Are you a late to bed, wake up late kind of person?

Kumar Birla 1:29:57 I don't sleep too much, I think it's five, five to six hours. So I sleep quite late, one, one thirty-

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:03 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:30:04 ... wake up by about seven thirty.

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:07 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:30:08 Um, yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:11 Typical weekend, what happens?

Kumar Birla 1:30:14 Saturdays I work till five o'clock.

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:16 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:30:20 Weekends typically is, is for the kids and some friend.

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:24 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:30:26 Mm. Uh, as the kids have grown older, in the last few years in, in particular, they, they start... They have their own program, right? They have their own-

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:34 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:30:35 ... plans. Um, so it's interesting. In a, in a way, it gives you more time to yourself. Yeah, there's nothing, there's no nothing that's-

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:48 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:30:49 ... um, asked in stone at all.

Nikhil Kamath 1:30:51 What age is that when kids don't want to hang out with their parents, and they want to hang out with their friends? Fifteen, sixteen? Does it begin then?

Kumar Birla 1:31:00 I think so.

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:01 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:02 I mean, each child is different, but-... I think it's also important for them to, you know, have their own group of friends and-

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:13 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:13 -you know, sort of not hang out with parents all the time.

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:18 Your son did very well at cricket, didn't he? Something he will pursue even in the future?

Kumar Birla 1:31:25 No. So he, he played, uh, professional cricket for seven years. Uh, after he played Ranji, he decided to give it up because all his decision to get into it, to get out of it-

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:38 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:39 -because he felt that staying on would mean a lot more commitment in terms of time.

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:45 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:46 And eventually, he wanted to get into work.

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:48 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:50 So he worked with me for four years.

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:51 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:52 Uh, he's now doing his MBA at Harvard.

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:55 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:56 Finishes in May.

Nikhil Kamath 1:31:58 Mm-hmm. Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:31:59 Yeah, but he had... I can see that, um, there's a lot of la- learnings that he's carried from his days, uh, playing cricket.

Nikhil Kamath 1:32:10 Yeah. Do you think-

Kumar Birla 1:32:11 Attention span-

Nikhil Kamath 1:32:12 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:32:13 -ability to deal with all kinds of people. Um, on time, always, running meetings on time today, very disciplined. Um, yeah, so I think it's shaped him well as an individual.

Nikhil Kamath 1:32:32 Do you think sport helps business?

Kumar Birla 1:32:35 Sports help business?

Nikhil Kamath 1:32:37 In the sense that if you're good at a sport-

Kumar Birla 1:32:39 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:32:40 -it'll give you an added edge when you come to the corporate world.

Kumar Birla 1:32:45 Again, I think it's very person specific, Nikhil. I mean, you can't generalize.

Nikhil Kamath 1:32:49 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:32:49 In his case, it really did. Uh, I'm sure he would have picked up some of these qualities even otherwise, but I think playing professionally for six, seven years, traveling all over the country-

Nikhil Kamath 1:33:03 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:33:04 ... second class, non-AC train, I mean, he wouldn't need to do that, right? If he wasn't playing some... I mean, he wasn't in a sport like cricket. Um, staying in sort of back of the beyond places.

Nikhil Kamath 1:33:18 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:33:20 Uh, you know, sort of being with people who are very different-

Nikhil Kamath 1:33:25 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:33:25 ... in terms of their backgrounds. From him, most wouldn't even speak Hindi. But he, you know, made some good friends. I, I think that, that was a huge learning for, for him. Started off when he did serving drinks-

Nikhil Kamath 1:33:41 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:33:41 ... you know, uh, to the players, and then went on to play Ranji. So it was quite an experience for him. Very enriching, I could see.

Nikhil Kamath 1:33:52 Did you never consider buying an IPL team?

Kumar Birla 1:33:55 No.

Nikhil Kamath 1:33:56 No? Because?

Kumar Birla 1:34:00 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:02 Do you like sport? Do you like watching cricket?

Kumar Birla 1:34:04 Yeah, I mean, not cricket in particular.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:06 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:34:06 I'm not particularly a good sportsman.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:08 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:34:08 I couldn't understand the model of the IPL for the longest.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:12 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:34:14 Um, it's about capital allocation as well, right? I mean-

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:18 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:34:19 ... when you have a lot of, uh, interesting opportunities before you-

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:23 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:34:23 ... you've got to make choices.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:24 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:34:25 I'm not the sort of person, nor is my family or my son, the kind of person who would say: "Because I've been a cricketer, let's buy, buy an IPL team."

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:36 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:34:37 Doesn't work like that.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:39 Any sport you like outside of cricket?

Kumar Birla 1:34:42 So I've been a-- I've played different sports at different points in time, but never really pursued anything, unfortunately.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:49 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:34:50 Uh, the last, the, I spent the most time on shooting.

Nikhil Kamath 1:34:54 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:34:54 Uh, and I thought I'd play at least some kind of competitive level, didn't get to that. Not been shooting for the last two years because of a shoulder injury.

Nikhil Kamath 1:35:04 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:35:04 But that's something that I find very interesting.

Nikhil Kamath 1:35:07 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:35:08 So my, uh, my track, so to speak, is 10 meters, um, pistol.

Nikhil Kamath 1:35:16 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:35:18 And it just is so exciting. I mean, it just takes your mind away. It's... Gives you feedback-

Nikhil Kamath 1:35:25 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:35:25 ... as to how good a man you are, which I think is quite important to me. That's the reason why I like the sport, but I think it's just, just something you really enjoy.

Nikhil Kamath 1:35:37 So tomorrow, if the world were finding a more dystopian version of itself, you'd be good with a gun?

Kumar Birla 1:35:47 My God!

Nikhil Kamath 1:35:48 If need be. Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:35:53 It's not like, uh, I'm spending a lot of mind space or time on it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:35:56 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:35:57 It's something that I enjoy doing, you know? I go to the range every now and then. Again, there's, there's no regularity to it.

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:05 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:36:06 So no, it's not, it's not that kind of passion-

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:08 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:36:09 ... but I really enjoy it

Kumar Birla 1:36:10 when I'm out there.

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:12 Are you on social media?

Kumar Birla 1:36:13 No.

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:14 No?

Kumar Birla 1:36:15 You are a lot on social media.

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:17 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:36:18 What made you get onto it?

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:19 Mm. Not very active. I would post something maybe once in 10 days or something like that.

Kumar Birla 1:36:25 Mm-hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:28 Not much about my personal life, really.

Kumar Birla 1:36:30 So the objective is what?

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:32 Mm. The objective is getting more distribution.

Kumar Birla 1:36:39 More distribution in what way?

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:42 The more number of people who follow you or who are looking at what you're saying-

Kumar Birla 1:36:48 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 1:36:51 ... is more-- I'm not giving you the, like, superficial answer, but the real answer is it gives you more influence over a wider sect of society.

Kumar Birla 1:37:04 And what do you want to do with that influence?

Nikhil Kamath 1:37:08 ... I mean, that's a very positive thing, but-

1:37:10 Yeah.

1:37:10 How do you look at it?

1:37:12 I don't know exactly what yet, but if I feel like something has to change in society, it gives me a good mouthpiece to say these contrarian things that maybe I think need to be said, and other people are not saying it.

1:37:30 Yeah.

1:37:31 I do get into trouble for saying it, and I constantly change my mind about everything. I go to the extent of thinking that authenticity itself is transient. My authentic self today is going to be different from my authentic self tomorrow. So I do get called out for changing as often as I do. But I feel like I was saying earlier, I think that change is necessary for evolution. If I were to-

1:37:57 Is this change all-- changing all the time, which is being irrational, or it's changing because you have evolved and grown, and therefore, you have a different point of view?

1:38:08 Changing because you have more evidence at hand, and now the plice-- pluses and minuses stack up on the other side.

1:38:17 But that's true for most people, right?

1:38:19 Mm.

1:38:20 With new experiences-

1:38:22 Yeah

1:38:22 ... your perspectives change.

1:38:24 Is there something that you believed in and committed to very strongly

Nikhil Kamath 1:38:30 that you no longer believe in? Something from when you were younger.

1:38:36 No, I don't think, um, I-- there's nothing I can call out.

1:38:40 Mm.

1:38:41 Is there something like that for you? What sort of thing would you, would you be referring to?

1:38:48 Even something like a economic pu- policy. Mm, there might have been times back in the day when I spoke for benevolent capitalism, maybe being stretched as far as being known to be socialist. Mm, now it doesn't make sense to me. At some point, it felt like the right thing for society, too.

1:39:20 What, what made you change your point of view?

1:39:22 I think just more research, and you-

1:39:25 Your own experiences, maybe.

1:39:27 Yeah. I feel like in a, in a family, you can be communist almost, if it's your family. With a group of friends, you can be socialist. But as the group becomes wider, I don't think socialism works because trust factor falls very quickly. We don't trust people inherently that we do not know.

1:39:54 That we do not know?

1:39:55 Yeah, or have never seen.

1:39:57 Mm.

1:39:58 So socialism can work for ten people, but I don't know if it can work for ten thousand.

1:40:02 What makes you think about this?

1:40:06 Mm.

1:40:06 I'm really in- intrigued as to why, why would you think about this? There is something-

1:40:10 Mm.

1:40:11 Obviously, there is something underlying that makes you want to know more about this.

1:40:15 Mm. I feel like the most interesting question in life is to figure out why we are how we are. Like, I-

1:40:25 No, as individuals.

1:40:26 Individuals extrapolated down to society. I feel like I have no clue why I want what I want, why I do what I do. A large part is it to conform, but outside of that, why did I become the person who thinks that he wants to do A, B, or C? I have no idea. It comes from some interest in psychology and philosophy, one of the two.

1:40:54 When you go back to your childhood, for example-

1:40:56 Mm-hmm

1:40:58 ... you don't see any strains of connect with what you've done professionally?

1:41:02 Mm-hmm. Mm, nothing. If I was fourteen years old, and you asked me, "What do I want to become when I grow up?" I said, "The most conformist thing of the time," which in my vintage was, "I want to be a astronaut or a pilot," or something like that. But I, I can't, I can't paint a bridge from then to now.

1:41:28 Why would that bother you, though?

1:41:31 It, it doesn't really bother me. If I were to leave my profession and all of that aside and think of very innately what I want as a person... Like, if you were to ask me, "Nikhil, you're thirty-eight today, what do you want from life? Why are you the way you are today?" It feels like a interesting thing to ponder about, spend some time dwelling on what made me the way I am, and I think that's all psychology, essentially. Every school of psychology-

1:42:11 You're thinking about more from the point of view of shaping your future or-

1:42:14 No.

1:42:15 Why do you think about it?

1:42:16 Just understanding the present.

1:42:20 Mm.

1:42:20 I don't think I can ever shape my future or change something about me that already exists. Um, if I'm petty, I'm gonna remain petty. If I'm jealous, I'm gonna remain jealous. If I'm insecure, I'm gonna remain insecure.

1:42:37 Why do you feel that way? I mean, people do change, right? Circumstances change people. New exposures change people.

1:42:46 I feel like if it's a mask, you can change it. Inherently, if that's a trait in you, I think it's hard to change. I don't want to change anything. I, I don't want the contradiction of having to make an effort in saying, "I was petty. I must not be petty." I don't want to make that effort, and I don't think I can. But I just want awareness of why I am petty and how I got to be petty.... Yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:43:15 What would you do with that?

Nikhil Kamath 1:43:17 Nothing. Just know.

Kumar Birla 1:43:20 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:43:23 Yeah, just the awareness. I don't think there's anything I can do with it.

Kumar Birla 1:43:27 Is there, is there a learning for the future, or what would you do, do by this? What would you do by just knowing?

Nikhil Kamath 1:43:35 I think I would just understand life a little bit better. If I'm able to figure out why I am the way I am, will just give me a little bit more understanding about life, and I think that's all I'm hoping for. Uh, it's a really big question for me, actually.

Kumar Birla 1:43:53 Which is?

Nikhil Kamath 1:43:54 Why I am the way I am. These are interesting questions that I don't know if I'll ever have the answer to, but I can-

Kumar Birla 1:44:01 Mm

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:01 ... ponder about. Yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:44:05 You're a very introspective person, uh, Nikhil. I mean, it's-- I'm quite amazed at how many things you think so deeply about.

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:13 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:44:13 Is that something that's, that you've always, uh, done?

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:17 I would say-

Kumar Birla 1:44:18 Or is it something that it's a trait that you picked up from-

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:22 No, I've always-

Kumar Birla 1:44:22 ... your parents, or is that just you enjoy being, doing that?

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:27 Enjoy doing it, I think.

Kumar Birla 1:44:28 Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:30 Uh, not like I've found any answers. I'm, I probably have more questions than I began with, but it keeps me occupied.

Kumar Birla 1:44:40 You have, uh, [clear throat] lots of things on the work front, right, to keep you occupied?

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:45 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:44:46 Where do you get the time to think so deeply about so many different things?

Nikhil Kamath 1:44:50 I have enough time. I've realized that most of what I do is pretend to work. I had this conversation with somebody at some point of time. I-- it's slightly different for a lot of people, but one day I was sitting in my office and having this conversation with some CXO of our company, and my brother, and a couple other guys, and we all started saying this one after the other. One is like: "Okay, I pretend to work X hours a day out of the insecurity of knowing you're sitting in front of me and pretending to work." I don't think I do productive work- [chuckles] ... for more than, I don't know-

Kumar Birla 1:45:36 It's quite complex

Nikhil Kamath 1:45:38 ... maybe like ninety minutes a day, and that would be pushing it. The rest of the time is very repetitive work, and if I were to ask myself the question that I'm excusing my persona from that situation, how much would change? The answer most often that comes back to me is, "Not much."

Kumar Birla 1:45:59 Not much would change if?

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:00 If I was not there, for very many things.

Kumar Birla 1:46:05 Is that because the business has got to grow and-

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:09 No

Kumar Birla 1:46:09 ... doesn't require so much of your attention and-

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:11 No, no, it's not that

Kumar Birla 1:46:12 inputs.

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:12 It's not that. I feel like-

Kumar Birla 1:46:14 More than that

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:14 ... I feel like there are smarter people out there who are better positioned to make many of the decisions I make than me, and it is my ego which has gotten swollen up by virtue of the accidents in life, and has gotten me to this point where, you know, everybody, like, uh-- we're not like you guys. I mean, you guys are a hundred times bigger. But even at my scale, invariably, you get surrounded by so many yes-men.

Kumar Birla 1:46:45 That sounds like, uh, [clinking] you're ready to start a new business.

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:50 You think?

Kumar Birla 1:46:51 Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:51 [chuckles] Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:46:58 Is that true?

Nikhil Kamath 1:46:59 No. No. Mm, it just sounds like, I think, um... I don't know what I want, but I know a little bit more about what I don't want.

Kumar Birla 1:47:16 In terms of work?

Nikhil Kamath 1:47:17 Mm. I don't want to waste any more of my life pretending to work. The productive work that I do, I will do, and the rest of the time I can utilize in learning, and reading, and exploring, and doing things I actually cherish doing.

Kumar Birla 1:47:38 So you're saying, you're saying you're pretending to work for whose benefit?

Nikhil Kamath 1:47:42 Nobody's benefit, but for the insecurity of when you're in an ecosystem, say there's four of you sitting together, because the other three are pretending, I am also pretending. And I feel like a lot of the world is going to go there with all the evolution that's happening in tech.

Kumar Birla 1:48:03 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 1:48:04 I think most people will be pretending to work a lot more than they were pretending to work yesterday.

Kumar Birla 1:48:11 Mm-hmm. Because of social media?

Nikhil Kamath 1:48:15 Because of also tech making their jobs far more efficient if they so choose to utilize it.

Kumar Birla 1:48:23 That's quite, uh, unfortunate, don't you think? So much of pretense and pretense about working when you can do so many better things [chuckles] in that same time.

Nikhil Kamath 1:48:32 But I think that's been society from the beginning of time. I feel like in that hierarchy, every manager does le- lesser than the people he manages, and every manager's manager does lesser. It's actually, like, inversely proportional to the reward they get for the work.

Kumar Birla 1:48:52 Could be because they've grown up, up the ladder, right? So they've been, uh, in a situation where their subordinates were or are, and they've gone through that rigor. Yeah, that's quite possible, I think. So have you... Is your work pretty close to where you live, or your office, or?

Nikhil Kamath 1:49:17 Yeah, it's not far.

Kumar Birla 1:49:19 ... I guess that's the way to work around this situation, right?

Nikhil Kamath 1:49:21 Yeah. Yeah. We can have that. I think, you like dark chocolate?

Kumar Birla 1:49:30 Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:49:36 Okay, so we were at--

Nikhil Kamath 1:49:41 You started interning. Uh, we go back there, and then what happened next?

Kumar Birla 1:49:50 Uh-

Nikhil Kamath 1:49:50 We're in the year '86, '87, something like that.

Kumar Birla 1:49:55 Yeah, I think... Yeah, so I'm working with my father.

Nikhil Kamath 1:50:01 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:50:02 Um, complete my graduation and my CA. Um, uh, you know, it's, it's, it's a lot of work, um, but good work. I mean, it's good. You get rapped on the knuckles once in a way, but you learn to sort of accept that as a way of life. Also, you know, the intent, uh, is right. I also start looking at some of the units independently, and I feel a great sense of almost like gratitude because, uh, all my friends, I mean, their fathers treated them like they were nothing on earth.

Nikhil Kamath 1:50:48 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:50:48 Um, and if I got, uh, the opportunity to have independent charge of fertilizer unit and a cement unit, uh, that really meant a lot, and that was huge learning.

Nikhil Kamath 1:51:00 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:51:02 Um, different time. I mean, my, my father and I would sit, uh, at the end of every month, and he would analyze or want me to analyze all the breakdowns that happened in the f- three, four cement plants that we had, which is quite painful. But it was relevant because at that time, you sold what you made, right? There wasn't anything, any other variable that was important. But, uh, it's just been very boring, and I used to think to myself, "You know, I want to have so many kilns that Papa can't ask me, me to be doing this every month."

Nikhil Kamath 1:51:38 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:51:38 It was just such a boring thing to do. Uh, but yeah, it was... I, like I said, steep learning curve. Um, I got married in '89. Uh, went off to my MBA after that at, at London Business School, which was, uh, again, huge, uh, learning and very transformational in some ways.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:10 That was post-marriage?

Kumar Birla 1:52:11 That was post-marriage.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:14 It says that you only met your wife three or four times pre-marriage.

Kumar Birla 1:52:18 Yeah, I mean, that's what, uh, that's how it happened then.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:23 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:52:24 Twice, not even three or four times.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:26 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 1:52:28 Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:28 Isn't that awkward?

Kumar Birla 1:52:28 So it was quite tough on both of us. Sorry?

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:30 Isn't that really awkward to manage?

Kumar Birla 1:52:31 It really is.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:32 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:52:33 But, uh, you know, at that time, in our community, for sure, that's how things... That's how, uh, you know, marriages happened.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:45 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:52:46 That was just the norm, and you just, uh, kind of flowed with the tide.

Nikhil Kamath 1:52:54 Mm. Okay, and then you went off to college in London?

Kumar Birla 1:52:59 Went to college, um-

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:00 Studied business?

Kumar Birla 1:53:02 No, Lon- London Business School.

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:03 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:53:05 A good two years, great learning. Met a lot, lot of different kinds of people from across the world, come back. Uh, in another couple of years, my father got detected with cancer and then passed away soon after that. So life changed quite dramatically-

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:24 Traveling alone or like with family back then to college?

Kumar Birla 1:53:28 Me?

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:29 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:53:29 With family.

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:30 Like, with wife?

Kumar Birla 1:53:31 With wife. Yeah, we were together when I was studying.

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:34 Mm. So came back, Dad was ill, immediately joined the business?

Kumar Birla 1:53:41 I was, in any case, working-

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:43 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:53:43 ... completely with him, right?

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:45 Even while-

Kumar Birla 1:53:45 Before I left

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:45 ... you were in college?

Kumar Birla 1:53:46 Not in college-

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:47 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:53:47 ... no. But, you know, it was just the natural thing to do, uh, come back and join him-

Nikhil Kamath 1:53:54 Mm

Kumar Birla 1:53:55 ... and pick up, you know, sort of start off from where I had left.

Nikhil Kamath 1:54:01 And is there a part of the business that you joined first?

Kumar Birla 1:54:06 I cut my teeth in textile, like I said, spent in, uh, spent a year on the top, on the shop floor.

Nikhil Kamath 1:54:12 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:54:14 Uh, I just felt that it's the most complex business that you could be in at that point in time, and therefore, it would be the best learning ground for me.

Nikhil Kamath 1:54:23 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:54:24 Most other businesses were easier to understand and run-

Nikhil Kamath 1:54:28 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:54:28 ... as compared to textiles then.

Nikhil Kamath 1:54:30 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:54:31 Um, cement was the other business that, uh, you know, uh, I was exposed to, ran a unit, uh, chemicals business, caustic soda product plant. When I say plant, it was a small plant, but, uh, you know, leadership experience is so invaluable. Uh, dealing with people with, uh... Yeah, all very new for me, right?

Nikhil Kamath 1:54:57 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:54:57 Bit like being, uh, Alice in Wonderland almost.

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:01 Was that the only game in town back then? 'Cause even when I read, say, your peer group's stories, like Reliance and all of them, everybody did textiles in that era? That was the biggest business in India?

Kumar Birla 1:55:14 That was one of the biggest businesses, yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:17 In the '80s?

Kumar Birla 1:55:19 '80s.

Kumar Birla 1:55:21 Maybe up until the early '90s as well.

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:23 Until India opened up?

Kumar Birla 1:55:25 Correct.

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:26 ... And how did it feel living in that India? Like, I've read about it. I was too young to be cognizant to it. Uh, I must have been, like, five, six years old in '91. How did it feel? What changed on the ground?

Kumar Birla 1:55:43 I was quite absorbed with I was doing-- with what I was doing, actually, Nikhil.

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:47 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:55:48 So you didn't know any better.

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:50 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:55:51 Uh, it's when India started to open up to the world in '95-

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:55 And when you say open up, can you elaborate? What happened when you say open up?

Kumar Birla 1:55:58 Liberalization.

Nikhil Kamath 1:55:59 Mm.

Kumar Birla 1:56:00 So tariffs started to come down. You had, uh, foreign investors coming into the market in India and investing in your company. Therefore, investor expectations were different because their profile was very different. You know, it was much more competitive. Tariffs came down in India. You had competition literally-

Nikhil Kamath 1:56:20 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:56:20 ... uh, at the back door.

Nikhil Kamath 1:56:22 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:56:22 Uh, therefore, the whole dynamic of running a business changed. Uh, you had to think about strategy, about people, needed new kind of talent, so it was quite a meta- metamorphosis at that point in time.

Nikhil Kamath 1:56:35 Mm-hmm. And did you get an investor into your business?

Kumar Birla 1:56:42 Um, no, when, when I say investor, I mean, they, they were also investing through the market, right? So the profile of investors-

Nikhil Kamath 1:56:50 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 1:56:51 ... who were investing in your company.

Nikhil Kamath 1:56:53 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:56:54 You didn't have private equity really back then, the way you have it now. Um, but when you have a different investor pool investing in the company, then, you know, investor expectations, uh, start to change. You become more accountable. Investors become more vocal.

Nikhil Kamath 1:57:13 What do you think of private equity and

Nikhil Kamath 1:57:15 venture capital today? It's very prevalent in my world, the startup world of today.

Kumar Birla 1:57:21 I, I think it's a, a very credible way of, uh, building assets or building, um, businesses. A different world, quite different from, uh, the world of business that I'm in, so to speak. It requires a different kind of, uh, skill set almost.

Nikhil Kamath 1:57:41 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:57:42 Um, but yeah, I think it's a huge source of equity today and capital, and it's a very credible way to grow a business.

Nikhil Kamath 1:57:51 Do you think private equity and venture funds today are a bit like the m- money lenders and zamindars of yesterday?

Kumar Birla 1:58:04 [chuckles] I don't think so.

Nikhil Kamath 1:58:05 No?

Kumar Birla 1:58:06 Um-

Nikhil Kamath 1:58:07 Crazy-

Kumar Birla 1:58:07 Why would you connect the two?

Nikhil Kamath 1:58:09 When I think about it, I feel like that. I mean, I do a little bit of both of those things, but whenever a private equity venture guy invests into your company, they have terms which mean that in case of liquidation, they get their money first. Uh, different clauses that make you share your upside. Uh, you know, there's venture debt and what... A whole bunch of, like, nuances there, but in many ways, it feels like somebody who made money somewhere. In case of PE and venture, it might be like, I don't know, LP sitting out of America. It might be some endowment fund, it might be some pension fund. Money coming from somewhere, finding a higher rate of return. It-- There's a lot of commonalities between that and how a money lender of yesterday has worked, right?

Kumar Birla 1:59:07 But you sign up to it, right, with your eyes and ears open-

Nikhil Kamath 1:59:09 Yeah

Kumar Birla 1:59:09 ... so it's fair.

Nikhil Kamath 1:59:10 As you did with the money lender.

Kumar Birla 1:59:13 Hmm. I think that's a bit of a harsh view on private. You've had a bad, bad experience with it?

Nikhil Kamath 1:59:16 No, no, I have not. [chuckles] I have-- We've never raised any capital in any way.

Kumar Birla 1:59:21 Hmm. No, I think it's, uh, a lot of it is about chemistry also, eventually, I think.

Nikhil Kamath 1:59:28 Hmm.

Kumar Birla 1:59:29 No, I think you're taking a pretty harsh view on them.

Nikhil Kamath 1:59:32 Hmm. Yeah?

Kumar Birla 1:59:34 Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 1:59:34 No, no, I'm not being harsh. I feel like they, they've serve a very useful purpose of marketing the India story outside of India in order to bring foreign capital into India, and it, it has subsidized consumption for a lot of people in India. We paid lesser for our taxis, paid lesser for food delivery, paid lesser for so many things, and industries grew in India, but on their backs.

Kumar Birla 2:00:01 Hmm.

Nikhil Kamath 2:00:01 So I'm, I'm not saying it's a bad thing. I'm just wondering if in a certain way, even money lenders yesterday did similar things.

Kumar Birla 2:00:11 I mean, there were atrocities happening back then.

Nikhil Kamath 2:00:14 Hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:00:15 These guys are what? They're, they're demanding investors.

Nikhil Kamath 2:00:18 Hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:00:18 And like I said, you pretty much sign up to what they're expecting, right? You wanting to... You, you need to, you need to align, uh, expectations. Um, I mean, but, you know, they have their own- you have the laws of the land that govern them as well. So if you're signing up to an agreement that's, uh, you know, one-sided, then that's something that you're, uh, knowingly signing up to.

Nikhil Kamath 2:00:48 If you had one

Nikhil Kamath 2:00:50 chance to redo life today, starting afresh, you're not Kumar Mangalam Birla, but you're just Kumar starting off-

Kumar Birla 2:00:58 Hmm

Nikhil Kamath 2:00:59 ... and you have X amount of capital, let's say a million dollars, what business would you put the money in?

Kumar Birla 2:01:05 Today?

Nikhil Kamath 2:01:05 Today.

Kumar Birla 2:01:07 I mean, there are many of them. That, that, that's always a problem, that there's a problem of plenty.

Nikhil Kamath 2:01:14 Hmm. One.

Kumar Birla 2:01:15 Difficult to, uh, boil down to one.

Nikhil Kamath 2:01:18 You're making bets on paints and jewelry.

Kumar Birla 2:01:23 Jewelry retail.

Nikhil Kamath 2:01:24 Why?

Kumar Birla 2:01:27 ... So different reasons, uh, paints because, you know, the industry is moving from being unorganized to more organized. Real estate is looking up. After COVID, people want their own homes. The nuclear family set up in India is kind of giving way to, uh, the joint family set up is giving way to nuclear families. Uh, aspirational Indian want- wants their own home. Home is a sense of achievement, a sense of pride. We also have an overlap with the existing cement business in terms of, uh, the dealership network-

Nikhil Kamath 2:02:04 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:02:04 -which is one of the key, uh, success factors required, uh, in something like paints. So all of that gives us a right to win, so to speak.

Nikhil Kamath 2:02:15 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:02:15 Jewelry retail, because we've been in the retail space for almost twenty-five years now, so we understand it fairly well, but that's apparel retail.

Nikhil Kamath 2:02:23 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:02:24 Uh, so doing another form of retail, uh, is, you know, logical. Uh, you then go by an empirical evidence of which sector is doing well and for what reason. Jewelry, because again, it, it, it goes back to an aspirational India. People want to feel good, look good. There's really only one national-level player. You have a couple emerging-

Nikhil Kamath 2:02:50 Tanishq.

Kumar Birla 2:02:51 But, um, since one of the objectives that we have very clearly marked out for ourselves when we get into a new business is that we want to be, uh, in a leadership position, which means number one, number two, at worst number three, the foreseeable future, uh, it ticks the sort of, uh, box on that one as well.

Nikhil Kamath 2:03:15 Still ninety-five percent unorganized?

Kumar Birla 2:03:18 Jewelry?

Nikhil Kamath 2:03:18 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:03:19 I don't know the percentage, but it is something... You know, it is a sector that's only now becoming more organized in the last few years, I think.

Nikhil Kamath 2:03:27 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:03:27 So that's an opportunity.

Nikhil Kamath 2:03:30 Anything else-

Kumar Birla 2:03:30 It's also, uh, the trust associated with the brand.

Nikhil Kamath 2:03:33 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:03:34 Um, I'm quite surprised, in the first month we had a thousand people who came with, you know, their gold jewelry and exchanged it for stuff from our store, which I thought was an interesting insight. Uh, so trust obviously plays a very important role in this, uh, in this business.

Nikhil Kamath 2:03:52 Do you have an opinion on lab-grown diamonds and what's happening in the diamond market?

Kumar Birla 2:03:57 Not really. I mean, uh, I know that, uh, uh, the value of diamonds has gone, gone down by about twenty percent in the last one year.

Nikhil Kamath 2:04:06 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:04:08 Uh, which is, you know, quite, uh, quite, uh, quite stark. Um, in India, too, jewelries doesn't seem to be only a, a investment class of asset. It's also just for aspirational and for the optics of it, um, which makes it, you know, it's a different business than what it would have been, say, even ten years ago. Uh, but obviously there's a different market for lab-grown diamonds, and, and it is growing very fast from what I understand. It's not our space, but it is something that's going to, uh, you know, take up some demand from, you know, retailers of precious jewelry.

Nikhil Kamath 2:04:52 It's something that you won't explore?

Kumar Birla 2:04:54 Not sure. We just... I think we first need to, uh,

Kumar Birla 2:05:00 consolidate here, and it's always an option.

Nikhil Kamath 2:05:03 What if a young entrepreneur had lesser money, like, say, one crore rupees or two crore rupees, and wanted to start a business? Is there a industry you think that has so much tailwind that they should really focus on?

Kumar Birla 2:05:16 So one crore is just, it's just not enough to start any business-

Nikhil Kamath 2:05:21 Yeah

Kumar Birla 2:05:21 ... in today's context.

Nikhil Kamath 2:05:22 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 2:05:22 I'd rather just keep it in the bank.

Nikhil Kamath 2:05:25 What if it was ten and not one?

Kumar Birla 2:05:30 I mean, hypothetical, but again, not so much that you can do. I mean, we're talking about in India where, you know, scale is important. How much can you do with ten crores? You see, what would you do with ten crores?

Nikhil Kamath 2:05:44 Me? I can start a jewelry store with ten crores, can't I?

Kumar Birla 2:05:50 Jewelry store would be more than that. I think it's about thirty crores.

Nikhil Kamath 2:05:53 Yeah, like a large one. Like a smaller one I could, right?

Kumar Birla 2:05:57 Depends on [chuckles] depends on what's the plan.

Nikhil Kamath 2:06:00 Mm. Maybe a lab-grown jewelry, lab-grown gold, low-value jewelry business.

Kumar Birla 2:06:04 Yeah, sure. That could be interesting.

Nikhil Kamath 2:06:07 Right? Like, try to build a brand of it.

Kumar Birla 2:06:09 Mm. Then scale on the back of the brand, is that what you're suggesting?

Nikhil Kamath 2:06:14 Yeah. Like, the novelty will be a brand in the beginning, right? Like, if I can only make jewelry which costs fifty thousand rupees and lower, and use lab-grown and gold, maybe the affordability... The one thing I feel is broken in jewelry stores is whenever people go shopping, it could be a married couple, it could be, say, a father, daughter, uh, the experience of walking into a jewelry store is very overwhelming and daunting. Because often whoever you're taking there to buy them something can pick something that you can't afford. So if there were a jewelry store with a ceiling, let's say, for example, nothing costs more than one lakh rupees-

Kumar Birla 2:07:07 Mm.

Nikhil Kamath 2:07:08 -almost like a dollar store, but, like, in a different way, I feel the experience of going in there and shopping might be less overwhelming. But it can't be sold like a budget thing.

Kumar Birla 2:07:22 So that's almost like a Zudio in the context of apparel.

Nikhil Kamath 2:07:24 Yeah.

Kumar Birla 2:07:27 I'm gonna have to try it out.

Nikhil Kamath 2:07:28 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:07:29 Quite interesting-

Nikhil Kamath 2:07:30 Right?

Kumar Birla 2:07:30 -I think. But it's a different, um, business case altogether.

Nikhil Kamath 2:07:35 Yeah.... Yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 2:07:39 Anything else you think, like advice to young entrepreneurs, what should they do now?

Kumar Birla 2:07:44 Advice to young entrepreneurs, uh, do what you love doing. Uh, keep the passion going. Get together a, a great team. That's most important. I mean, it's a team that achieves. Uh, you can be a good leader, but without a good team, there's not much that you can do, you know, uh, being just one single person. Uh, I'd say consistency-

Nikhil Kamath 2:08:13 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:08:13 Learning agility is very important. There's so much of change in the world today that to stay current and-

Nikhil Kamath 2:08:20 How-

Kumar Birla 2:08:20 ... tweak your, tweak, tweak your business model on the basis of what's happening in the world today, uh.

Nikhil Kamath 2:08:26 How do you change like you did? Like, you went from textiles to cement to, like, trying jewelry and paints today. These are all, like, completely different things. Uh, even someone like us, like, you know, we've been doing broking and asset management for a bit, or lending, we don't find it in ourself to be able to change. But people like you, intergenerational families, who pivot so easily, what are you doing that we are unable to do?

Kumar Birla 2:09:00 No, I'm not sure you're unable to do it. It's just that you haven't maybe reached, uh, that situation. It, it is, uh... You know, it does cause you to stress- you need you to stress more, stretch more.

Nikhil Kamath 2:09:11 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:09:12 But I think there's also a sense of excitement around that.

Nikhil Kamath 2:09:15 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:09:16 So as India is growing up or grew up-

Nikhil Kamath 2:09:18 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 2:09:19 ... new spaces opened up for private enterprise, right?

Nikhil Kamath 2:09:22 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:09:22 For example, financial services is a case in point.

Nikhil Kamath 2:09:26 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:09:27 Uh, there was a point in time, I think around '95, '97, when the AMC mutual funds started to open up-

Nikhil Kamath 2:09:38 Yeah

Kumar Birla 2:09:38 ... for private sector, then insurance, like that. So you don't wanna miss that opportunity.

Nikhil Kamath 2:09:44 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:09:45 Uh, so on and so forth, even with retail. At the end of the day, there is, uh, a national, a trend at, at least national level, if not international, that you are hooking up to. Um, it's also a call on whether you want to be a conglomerate or, uh, you know, one or two businesses.

Nikhil Kamath 2:10:08 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:10:08 And we took a call very early on, I did-

Nikhil Kamath 2:10:12 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 2:10:12 ... that we've grown up being a conglomerate-

Nikhil Kamath 2:10:15 Mm

Kumar Birla 2:10:15 ... and we have str- strengths in running different businesses, uh, and doing that successfully, and that's what we'd like the future paths to be like.

Nikhil Kamath 2:10:24 If I can ask you a very personal question: How do

Nikhil Kamath 2:10:27 you know it is the time to pivot? What do you feel in a certain business?

Kumar Birla 2:10:32 In a certain?

Nikhil Kamath 2:10:33 Business.

Kumar Birla 2:10:34 I think, um, uh, you s- you have- you get a sense that now this m- this business is mature enough. Uh, it's because you've been, you know, you're sort of growing with the business, your own understanding, uh, of the business, you know, gets deeper and deeper. It's a feel, it's an instinct.

Nikhil Kamath 2:10:53 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:10:53 Uh, I think an entrepreneurial- entrepreneur's instinct is, is a huge factor in this.

Nikhil Kamath 2:11:01 So when you feel a business is mature enough, you pivot, and you put your energy behind the new thing? And how does the old ship keep sailing?

Kumar Birla 2:11:10 It's not always like that. I mean, that makes it sound [chuckles] very mechanical. But I think that's, that's, uh, you know, that's something that, uh, even if it isn't in a conglomerate situation, if you have mature businesses that have sort of reached a cycle where growth rates are tapering-

Nikhil Kamath 2:11:32 Mm-hmm

Kumar Birla 2:11:32 ... you need to invest in new engines of growth. And essenc- essentially, that's the model that we have followed, if you look back and study. There's no brilliance, you know, attached to it. It's just, just, uh, common business sense.

Nikhil Kamath 2:11:50 How do you step back and let somebody else run the old ship?

Kumar Birla 2:11:53 Well, not the old ship, every ship, because like I was saying, uh, we're 180,000 people. Uh, my daughter is involved in some businesses, my son as well. But, you know, for, for the longest, it's just been me. Now, with my kids. So obviously it's not a family-run business, it's basically a people-run business. It's a people's organization. Uh, I think if you... I mean, trust is a very important factor. Uh, that there's something in your DNA which must allow you to trust people.

Nikhil Kamath 2:12:27 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:12:27 Uh, you also then, uh, obviously need to, need to choose the right people, and there's some method there, I think. I think if you have ambition, like when I, in '95, when I started out, I had ambition and, uh, I had lim- limited, limited experience. My father had just passed away. And logically, the only way I could build bandwidth, and that stays true even today, was by getting people with more experience on board and with different talents, that talent skill sets that we had in the organization. So I think it's also to do with ambition and passion. Uh, if you want to grow, the only way to grow is to have energized teams. I mean, there's no, uh, you know, there is no other way out. Uh, and that's the fundamental principle on which we are working.

Nikhil Kamath 2:13:25 Yeah. I, I feel like I have a lot to learn from you in this. Is there something you look for in people when you're doing this pivot, from the people you're hiring? Is there something in particular?

Kumar Birla 2:13:36 So there, there's two, two kinds of people, those who've grown up in the organization... So I have about, uh, 4,000 people who've been with me for-... twenty-plus years. With people like that, you know them pretty much.

Nikhil Kamath 2:13:51 Yes.

Kumar Birla 2:13:51 I mean, I don't, I may not know all of them-

Nikhil Kamath 2:13:52 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:13:52 -but HR would, other people in the system would. So that's, that's, you know, being a meritocracy. You have a track record within the company, and a meritocracy means that you're pretty much, uh, getting ahead, uh, basis the merit that you've earned for yourself. For people from outside, um, it's, it's a gut feel. You look at their track record, you speak to them, you, you do sound referencing. It's a gut feel. I mean, you think... I, I look at people, uh, and I ask myself: Can they handle complexity? Uh, are they agile learners? Uh, and would they be able to lead large and diverse teams of people? And that, that sense you can only get with, uh, talking to them, right? There's no other way. Uh, so I think more than just, uh, res- referencing, it's, it's about your own instinct-

Nikhil Kamath 2:14:49 Right

Kumar Birla 2:14:49 ... your own, own, uh, uh, experience, uh, with, uh, different kinds of profiles of people.

Nikhil Kamath 2:14:57 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:14:58 Um, so it is a leap of, leap of faith at the end of the day.

Nikhil Kamath 2:15:02 Right. They say that when people are on their deathbed, the things that they

Nikhil Kamath 2:15:08 often regret are things like, "Why did I work so hard? Why did I worry about how I'm being perceived? Uh, why didn't I spend time with my friends?" Stuff like that. What do you think it will be for you? What would be the regret?

Kumar Birla 2:15:27 I mean, I, I don't know, uh, to be honest, Nikhil. I don't know if there are going to be regrets. I mean-

Nikhil Kamath 2:15:32 Mm

Kumar Birla 2:15:33 ... uh, but I think that, um, especially in the last fifteen years, I'd say I've lived life quite thoughtfully. Uh, and I mean, life's been kind. Uh, I've had more challenges. Life has thrown me more, uh, curveballs on the left side than, uh, I can even sort of talk about it. One can-- anyone can, could even imagine. But, um, you know, there have been so many things on the positive side as well. So one feels a sense of gratitude. I don't think at this point of time, [chuckles] if I was to die, be on my death bed, bed today, I don't think there's anything I'd hugely regret. I mean, I've never had, for example, a work-life balance, but that's been by choice for, for various reasons, right or wrong. It's not happened by default. There have been reasons behind it, which to me, uh, are logical, well thought through. Um, I, I don't think that there is any such regret I would have. Of course, if I have another thirty years to live, at least, the situation might change. Uh, but yeah, I mean, God's been kind. I don't, I don't have any... I mean, regret would be, for example, I wish my father was there for longer. That's not something you regret at the end of life. I mean, that's... Your regret is about to do with life choices that you have made. So I think so far it's gone well.

Nikhil Kamath 2:17:04 Mm-hmm. Nice. I think that's it. We've covered all that we wanted to today. Thank you for, uh, doing this.

Kumar Birla 2:17:13 No, it's been interesting, Nikhil. You're doing, uh, a great, uh, job of, uh, this, and I'm, I know a lot of people

Kumar Birla 2:17:20 watch your podcasts and, uh, you know, I'm, I'm sure draw inspiration from them.

Nikhil Kamath 2:17:27 Any fleeting words to the many young entrepreneurs who will be so inspired by watching this? Anything that you want to tell them which is non-obvious, someone looking to start up?

Kumar Birla 2:17:40 I think the power of, uh, consistency-

Nikhil Kamath 2:17:44 Mm.

Kumar Birla 2:17:44 ... the soft power of consistency, something that we don't always, uh, value.

Nikhil Kamath 2:17:50 Mm-hmm.

Kumar Birla 2:17:50 Uh, that's, in my experience, very important. As you grow in your careers, you start to realize that. It's good to know that early on.

Nikhil Kamath 2:18:01 Nice. [upbeat music] Thank you so much for doing this-

Kumar Birla 2:18:04 Thank you for your time

Nikhil Kamath 2:18:04 ... and taking the time with us.

Kumar Birla 2:18:05 It's been a pleasure.

Nikhil Kamath 2:18:06 Thank you. Thanks, guys. Thanks, everyone. [chuckles] Is it okay?

Kumar Birla 2:18:12 Yeah, yeah.

Nikhil Kamath 2:18:13 We shot quite a bit, huh?

Kumar Birla 2:18:15 You're quite an intense guy, huh?

Nikhil Kamath 2:18:17 [chuckles] Three and a half hours. But it was good, I think.

Kumar Birla 2:18:23 ...

Nikhil Kamath 2:18:24 Huh?

Kumar Birla 2:18:24 ...

Nikhil Kamath 2:18:24 No, no.

Kumar Birla 2:18:24 You think so much. [chuckles] Wow, Nikhil!