EP 16 The Indian Century

[00:00:00] This is India a story in the making and I am your host, Loveena Tandon. Hello and welcome to India a story in the making. If you want to understand the nuances and the essence of new India and the opportunities

[00:00:14] that it presents to make you a rich person then stay on look no further because I have as a guest a person who can see opportunities from miles away. He is the one who sold his first company for under half a billion dollars and it was a travel

[00:00:35] company that went on the internet, it hit the NASDAQ and also was the first on the London stock exchange. He then after selling this turned to become to politics and became a member of parliament

[00:00:51] in the European parliament MEP and took charge of the India desk and cut to now he is running an energy company in Romania. My guest today Mr. Dinesh Thamichar I have known him for few years now.

[00:01:07] Welcome it's easy for you to make money now you have to tell all of us how did you make the money and how can we do that? You told me about making money in India or making money here? Anywhere money is the same.

[00:01:20] But how he actually beautifully fits into this show is because of this book the Indian century that he has recently written and that's where this is a gold mine I have to say.

[00:01:32] I have I'll tell you I want to show you I have made notes and have written my things on it. Don't worry I'm not going to take your exam on it. You have actually redefined being on force.

[00:01:47] You can tell you empowered being on force one foot in UK other one in Malta then one in Romania and the one in India as well because you take pride in being the member of Jim Khanna and what was that the class? God class. God class.

[00:02:05] And you already know who is a member? It's because it's so hard to become a member. Okay I believe that but more so for me for this India century. So first then I can call you Dineesh. Please tell me your story.

[00:02:25] You came here when you were 18 and then you from 18 to selling ebookers.com for under half a billion please tell me. Wow. How many minutes do you need or days?

[00:02:48] I came from doing my ISC Indian School certificate in India and came to do my A levels in King School Canterbury both my brother and I and we did our A level we took our A levels and then we went to Cambridge University.

[00:03:07] Both of us went to Cambridge as my father had done before. We I mean we worked I worked for a few companies short stints including IBM and then I started my own business because I worked out that if you work for yourself you could be self

[00:03:30] employed and thus you didn't have to pay 40% tax which was the lowest tax bracket in those days. The labor government was in and 10% national insurance which made it 50%. So half your salary went to the government and I thought that if I could earn the same

[00:03:55] amount and expense things for example for my own business of course I could then double my salary living because I have double salary and that's what made me go into business and I didn't care if it was travel or shoemaking. So are we talking about which one 1978?

[00:04:19] I'm talking about 1979, 1980. Okay so how did you choose your business? I mean you said doesn't matter travel or shoe how did you pick on travel then? Well someone came along and said what about our travel business and here's the premises

[00:04:38] you can have this and it was in Old Score Tube station it was like a shoebox you know and so but we could buy three of us would fit in and so we said why not?

[00:04:51] So at this point and by the way as my father was a diplomat I had traveled I was born in Australia and I traveled all around the world and I was a traveler from the beginning since I was born. So you were married at that time?

[00:05:10] I was married yeah I got married in 1977. You had children? One and one on the way. Wow so one child one on the way left the job a good job I would assume an IBM. IBM is a good job.

[00:05:26] Yeah and period and started your own did you worry about the risk that it involves? You always worry about risk but when you're you know you've got two kids or one on the

[00:05:42] way one there you need to earn a bit more money and in those days there was the minor strikes and there was rubbish lying on the crop on every street corner because everyone

[00:05:56] was striking and we needed money to exist short of robbing a bank I had to start my own business. But then that is doing away with your so I'm looking at from the point of view of

[00:06:10] people who worry that if you don't have a job how would you make your month you have to go pay a rent? So what did you start with and how much did you start with? You mean salary?

[00:06:27] No money what did you have in the did you have enough savings to save your I had about three thousand pounds of savings which I'd earned in Iran working up to seven or eight months because there were no taxes there and I put that

[00:06:43] down as a deposit for my flat in Shephard Bush. So you had a mortgage as well? I got the mortgage and then I left the job. And how much did you put in the business? Oh gosh we're asking friends across London to bring stationery from their

[00:07:04] offices and stuff like that so very little and actually from day one we started selling theatre tickets first and from day one we never looked back we we have always made more money in the day that we needed to spend towards a mortgage or anything else.

[00:07:26] So what did you do different to the other travel agents and how did you crack that different? Just working hard seven days a week and you know hoping that people would come in for example we didn't know much about travel although we traveled quite a lot

[00:07:45] so people used to come to us and say please can you tell me what the price of a ticket to Sydney was because that was Kangaroo Land at that time, Earl's Court. And we would look up the book and give the full fare which was like two

[00:08:03] thousand pounds or whatever it was you know and airlines were selling to travel agents to the real travel agents. Cut price bucket shop tickets you know discounted tickets so same seats same everything so we found out who to approach how to approach over time we

[00:08:28] got to get all the contacts with the airlines and got the prices of you know the cheaper prices of tickets. So was it as simple as saying okay someone has given me this because you were risking your entire life on this pretty much leaving a job.

[00:08:49] But what life? The only life I could have had was go back to India you know because my parents lived there so that was my backstop but I didn't want to do that because that's admitting defeat.

[00:09:04] Okay so when you say we who all were there in the business? Me and my wife. So you and your wife were working together wow and she was also pregnant at the time. I think she just had a baby or she well second

[00:09:22] some was born in April 1980 and after that I think well she was helping out and her parents were over helping with the kids and so on so forth you know usually in your family. Wonderful what is the key for someone who's looking out from a job

[00:09:46] to do what you did today to make. I was young that's very important you know the older you get the wiser you get and you start seeing all the pitfalls the non-opportunities the things and it's true one in five or

[00:10:07] one in ten businesses survive after five years so the odds are against you. So what was the key of your success and then when did you feel success? Luck hard work unskill. I'm getting to that skill I'm trying very hard.

[00:10:30] That's the deal no no it's luck and hard work I mean listen Ocullian New Delhi railway station starts at six in the morning works at 11 back breaking he doesn't make it. So when did you so tell me the story of getting onto the internet and the opportunity

[00:10:49] that you saw that? Oh simple I used to travel quite a lot I was on travel business so I went to the States and I saw how the internet was working then I became a member of an organization called YPO

[00:11:05] the Young President's Organization they used to have people showing off their businesses on the internet etc also used to go to Harvard Business School for for a week learning what's going on and there were other case studies too but there were internet case studies too

[00:11:23] and one day this professor in 96 or 97 gets up and says ladies and gentlemen the the market capitalization of Yahoo, AOL and Amazon were the three companies in those days Yahoo AOL yeah there was no Google or anything and the GDP of Zambia, Kuwait and New Zealand

[00:11:54] are the same you said how is that possible? They're a company that had just started two three years ago having the same market capitalization and that shook me and I said hang on if that is the case

[00:12:16] I must get my business so there were three types of businesses that did very well initially one was travel one was sex and the third one was finance these three did really well on the internet

[00:12:40] I think it was finance I've forgotten now there were three and I was in travel and I said hang on why can't we do this in the UK so I learned that a bit of lateral thinking I brought it here

[00:12:57] and you were the first travel company to do so right we were the first out we bought the software from a German company in Stuttgart, a place called Hydebond and then we were the first that perpetuated then we went and bought companies that had got that software

[00:13:18] but couldn't do much with it in different countries so we had 11 countries in Europe and then what difference did it make for you? Well my competition was selling to 60 million people here and I was selling to 300 million people 11 countries right so obviously I would have

[00:13:39] more footfall as they say in inverted commas so you were making money when you were sleeping? But the internet does but I always see every business makes mistakes it's just that

[00:13:52] it's easy to cover up with good stuff not cover up in a bad way but cover up with good stuff than for a smaller market so the seasonality here when do people book they don't book

[00:14:06] all the around was taken and helped me with Europe because I could the Spanish the Mediterranean people booked at different times of the year to the northern European so that even did all out for

[00:14:20] me so stuff like that there were lots of good things that came with 300 million people as a matter when did you sell the company then? In February 2005 and how did you make that decision

[00:14:34] what I'm trying to get at is that you saw well my wife said sell and she said I don't want to be part of this rat race and so a year before eight nine months before actually even less

[00:14:50] she said I'm leaving and you carry on so I said hang on I better sell. I see you were told. Always. Fantastic so Dinesh tell me how you left a job you started a company you didn't know

[00:15:10] Scooboo you left the job and started a company and you didn't know anything about the business per se and then you made it to a point that you found the opportunity of internet

[00:15:27] embrace that and then sold it and made your money how did you see all these three opportunities and what does it take to make the most of it? Well the first opportunity was more

[00:15:43] on blue sky thinking the second was obviously with more knowledge and the third was a land grab the land grab being house first and for example we went public on the NASDAQ and raised 38 million

[00:16:02] pounds I'm giving you the conversion it was 61 million dollars of course we only got 53.9 million dollars because the bankers took that commission from 61 but that you have to give yeah

[00:16:20] and I went to Yahoo in AOL and I said I'd like to advertise on your networks and I want Germany France and the UK and they said we'll come back to you tomorrow and they ran me

[00:16:41] the next day and said you raised 38 million pounds for three a contract we won 19 million so I said how can you ask I've got to spend on offices people, god knows what else and you're

[00:16:54] taking 19 which is take it only that so I thought perhaps I could raise more money as I'd raise this money and I said okay what actually happened I didn't know that an internet

[00:17:14] year is a dog year so it's like three years was like 21 years and by the time the competition tried to get on in three years time because I had a monopoly for three years my sales were 600 million dollars in three years you see so then they couldn't compete

[00:17:45] because I was giving so much business to the airlines and hotel companies that they would always give me preferential rates and because they gave me preferential rates I could beat the competition not totally but the only company that raised a lot of money was last minute

[00:18:06] and so it was just e-bookers versus last minute hmm and and you had your wife besides your oldest while how is it working with your wife at home and at well we were really working we went at home most of the time yeah

[00:18:23] yeah and we would you you can say okay you look after home and then she comes and says you're not spending enough time with me we don't you didn't do this you didn't so all those problems

[00:18:36] if she knows what's going on in the office none of those problems exist and what were you divided and this is what you're going to look at yeah yeah I mean she's more detailed person and I'm more an expert so you went and made all those calls

[00:18:52] and meetings and all of that correct brilliant so after you tell me the day it went on nestack I think it was the 11th of November 1999 I think at the end of October and we were in our

[00:19:08] roadshow my father died so I had to cut actually just so happened we finished in Milan in a roadshow in Milan and Saturday morning we were going to get up and go to the airport

[00:19:30] to go back to London and my sister-in-law ranked above our dad so I had to get on a flight in London arrive on Sunday lunchtime because it was a night flight so I came back got on a flight and cremated my father because I was the eldest son

[00:19:59] and that same night I took the flight which was Sunday I took the flight back to London arrived at five in the morning because we're gaining time and I had eight meetings

[00:20:12] in London and Scotland that day wow so that was you know so and then a couple of days later we we were well we went to New York and we had to take the concord because we gained time

[00:20:30] going to New York so that we have the whole day of meetings there and so on so it was uh the days honestly how did you manage to do that though they didn't even stay focused

[00:20:43] we had just because I knew what I was saying I mean saying it a lot of times so uh how was that what did you do was that your really low point I without many low points

[00:20:58] but that obviously was a disaster almost but you kept the show going absolutely hmm okay so then NASDAQ happens you get your millions let's say no I don't get my millions I get the company gets the millions yes so but you exit it no I didn't exit

[00:21:21] no NASDAQ happened I went IPO uh initial public offering you get 61 million you give the bankers that they do you give AOL and YAHUWU DAZ and all that and uh within a few months you have to raise more money and guess what happened the internet

[00:21:42] went down the tube in at the end of March wow and then but we've done enough hard work and sold had good sales that people put into mind so we raised another 45 million

[00:21:58] uh dollars and then we didn't really know what we had a lot of problems I mean low points were 9 11 for example and from then to your political career what was happening I had a tenure non-compete when I sold and because I had a tenure non-compete

[00:22:21] I couldn't go into I didn't know anything else so I said okay we'll go to property you know the usual thing but the main thing here is not property it was charities so I set up a couple

[00:22:35] with my father-in-law and brother-in-law set up a couple of charities in India which are doing really well now we educate 1200 people street children in school in three schools and it's free and we have 15 clinics where we give uh 120,000 people free medicine every year

[00:23:00] and then I also went into as a trustee in two various charities here and gave money here as well before I went into politics and then you did the India desk I did I did the India desk and then

[00:23:16] we brexit it so I had to leave at the end of January and in February COVID hit so I'm sitting on my in the house didn't know what to do I thought I'd write a book so I wrote

[00:23:30] book it which is how I became an entrepreneur and I thought I'd start Green Energy they were in the European Parliament they were talking about green energy green energy green energy I said fine

[00:23:42] tell me about the green energy and how did you spot that opportunity what I'm trying to get to is spotting opportunity yes so as I as I was saying earlier when the cameras were off

[00:23:56] but you need to be in a position to take advantage and I had I bought a lot of land in Romania they were about to join the EU and I had sold the book so I had a lot of money

[00:24:18] and in 2007-08-09 when the financial crisis happened and the market started growing down I thought perhaps growing your own food would be quite good you know so I bought a lot of land I bought about

[00:24:33] a thousand acres why Romania very far land but my brother-in-law was the Indian ambassador there so he introduced me and they were about to join the EU and so you had EU law and that sort of thing

[00:24:54] so I had this land and I said hang on why don't I plaster it with solar panels and make it a solar panel so that's how the opportunity comes and then now you're on to selling

[00:25:09] electricity yeah solar panels make electricity yeah for in now coming on through the India in the Indian century this one how did this happen and why well I think it is the Indian

[00:25:24] century I think that in the next the the first 50 years of the century will be more Chinese century but the next 50 will be an Indian century and that's because of our demographic dividend and everything else so you someone who came out of India and then remained

[00:25:43] out of India now lives in Malta has a business in Romania yes you have esteemed memberships in India to various esteemed clubs but then what made you say that it's an Indian century when you

[00:26:01] have not experienced it really I think the way I try and make money in India and there are many ways of making money in India is not start a business and use that to people who live in India

[00:26:18] but as they have the contracts they have they know the lie of the land but the laws for investing in the stock markets are very very good for for foreigners and so

[00:26:35] if you say put I'm just giving a number of 1 million pounds into the stock market in India you have a something called an NRE account non-resident external account and you you have to invest in rupees so you have to convert the 1 million pounds into repeat

[00:26:59] and then if you ever wanted back it takes two to three days to get it back in pounds so there's no reserve everything is gone so billions are going from the United States and from Europe into India so India is a good investment opportunity for the stock market

[00:27:23] for now why the stock market because those are the best run companies in India because they have to have accounts they have to you know they have shareholders that are more than the family

[00:27:37] and so you know it's there is more accountability and because there's more accountability and look what's happening the stock market so I put in some money into India in October 22 and at the end

[00:27:54] of March I was up 34% in one and a half years and even if you lose on on transaction on currency you still no no no on transaction you should take into account a 5% loss in currency which means

[00:28:11] in one and a half years seven and a half percent but actually it only lost 3% or 2% but it might catch up we don't know but 34% amazing so give me an example in numbers you try and get that you try

[00:28:27] and get that here anywhere 34% on this on the markets you know that's why India is the best place for your money now no one's going to put it because of various connotations the third world

[00:28:45] country year war yeah but they don't know what they're talking about oh and that's where your book comes in place isn't it I'm trying to say guys I'm not telling you and doing something else

[00:28:56] I'm doing it myself so you made a case for India in this for who and why for who everyone who lives here lives outside India of course for India too by the way my whole family

[00:29:11] lives in India my mother's 96 she lives there my brother everyone my wife's relatives we're the only black sheep who live here everyone lives in India so we have good feedback and of

[00:29:25] course I went to school in Mayo Ajmer and in Sansevi's Delhi and I have a WhatsApp chat class of the class in WhatsApp so we talk every day as to what's going on

[00:29:44] and you make a case for India having moved leaps and bounds please tell me why the bus that India has today what is the reason behind it? I say that India has moved leaps and bounds and someone

[00:29:56] else says no it hasn't well there we are but that's why I look at statistics and statistics are that we were 10 years ago the ninth largest economy in the world and and now India is the

[00:30:14] fifth largest economy in the world so it went from a GDP of I don't know what to 3.5 trillion now the beauty of the next six years is that the World Bank not India but the World Bank says

[00:30:30] it will go from 3.5 trillion to 7 trillion by 2030 so within six years it'll go double so if you take a pin and put it in any stock you should double your money in six years correct

[00:30:51] but if you put it into the into one of the cybers like infrastructure which is being pushed which is being pushed you'll double it again you'll make 200% as I told you I made 34% in one of

[00:31:08] years so you have 200% whether India goes sideways up the World Bank is saying this now you have to believe the World Bank I would then say that there is I wouldn't say black economy but there's

[00:31:31] another economy which is about a third might end up at 10 trillion by the end so this is the time you can make a lot of money on the stock market don't put your money into property or anything

[00:31:47] no just that just the stock market a lot of people would say that who are sitting on the fringe especially when you use your book is speaking to the people who are living outside

[00:31:59] and making a case for them to say that India now is on confident foot and this is the time to invest in India but there are a lot of question marks about corruption about stability about the politics how do you address them well there's corruption in every country

[00:32:21] as long as you steer clear of it you're okay I mean are you saying there's no corruption in the United States or in the UK I mean 32 billion pounds and PPP for example yeah and carry on

[00:32:39] so I think that there is corruption but don't start taking the narrative of the Western press so what is your narrative what how do you how would you make the case let's say for India

[00:32:57] to someone I'm just saying you can make more money you put your money here you'll make less you put your money there you'll make more which hand do you want and if you don't if you want to be conservative I think you're better off in India

[00:33:15] because here you might lose money there was a kind of positivity if I can say about India once before as well and there is one the buzz the calling it the Indian century like you have

[00:33:34] has been far more now from Morgan Stanley and you said World Bank and you said in all the other everyone and even before the elections are finishing you have was the politicians in civil service talking before now it's business

[00:33:50] right so you're going to see it in the figures what is the difference what happened in these 10 years that was so different to the others before well there was nothing happening the red tape was there

[00:34:04] corruption was there everything was there even now there's still cases taking 20 years in courts but not enough judges the collegium system is and is not working he's you know just as delayed as justice denied so there's a lot of things that India has to do

[00:34:27] to be it's not the paradigm of virtue what are the challenges and what are the you have legal system to start with the 3 400 million people who don't have running water

[00:34:41] and electricity so if you were to say in in few three points or whatever you want I'm saying three what is working for India's of now and what is it that are the challenges and what are the

[00:34:53] three solutions you see what's working for India is that we have more fairness as an entrepreneurship is allowed to take off we have I mean in a sense Mr Modi is lucky that he's

[00:35:12] been here this time but also his policies not be bad I think socialism means giving more people a lot curbs entrepreneurism and entrepreneurism is what creates jobs you got a lot of money

[00:35:36] then you should be social socialist but that's my view I might be totally wrong so what how do you I said three three three so your challenges and your solutions what is it that India needs to do

[00:35:50] to keep going keep going keep going the way it is I mean have a single window policy for example for all licenses so that you don't have to touch if you have if you need 13 permits you need 13 people to talk to put everything online they're doing that

[00:36:15] um the no case should take more than two years why is it taking 20 years in fact my father it's in the book uh my father started a case with 15 other people and I think in the 60s

[00:36:34] and there was a land compensation dispute with the government still going on I mean let's say it was 1970 right it was earlier but 70 that's 30 years of the last century and 24 years of this century so that's 54 years yeah so you're saying that the justice system needs

[00:36:57] to be lined out and justice needs to be rapid rapid that's the one challenge that that's that's a big I mean there are many challenges of course infrastructure I think Mr. Nitin Gadkari is doing a great job with infrastructure I remember

[00:37:18] Mr. Kamal Nath was there for the congress before I think I think it was him where they were trying to get roads done they couldn't get roads done like now this Bombay Delhi highway it's 2000 kilometers long goes through eight states or whatever it is

[00:37:44] a 40 hour journey can be done in 11 hours yeah time is money GST national GST it used to take nine days from Dalinadu to Delhi for goods to arrive because they had to go through nine states and you know whatever used to happen 90 now it takes two days

[00:38:11] indeed yeah I remember I went to Bandhan Gurd not very long ago and I was born in Jabalpur and I was thinking I was told my children and that's how I started this thinking about this

[00:38:22] episode as well and I told them oh yeah now you have to sit die three hours of journey of rocky up and down up and down roller coaster and just a little patch from the airport

[00:38:33] on the main road and it was silk smooth and I thought wow I haven't seen this for so long so I think that infrastructure that so that that's why infrastructure is worth putting money into

[00:38:49] in the stock market so you also one more thing that I was reading a book I thought of was that you mentioned that as compared to the natives even if the white population here

[00:39:04] there is a lot of more success there in terms of owning a house or stuff like that why do you see and you made a case of education but why is it that there is one fact and that is immigrants

[00:39:20] work harder period the first generation of immigrants work harder than the native population so do you mean that when we have success we will not work as hard well you see the second generation it doesn't work as hard

[00:39:42] okay so now if you have to tell the people about your book and why they should read it make a case make a case I think that they should just listen to me and not read the book

[00:39:59] and that is that do what I do I'm investing in India in the way I've just told you try it with five percent of the money that you have and and then increase it or sell

[00:40:13] I told the lie it's as simple as that I just I just want everyone to make as much money as I make because everyone can make money or and yeah you said it's easy to make money I just told you how easy

[00:40:27] to please tell me so if someone has a what a thousand pound to spend what do you do with it the thousand is about a lack of rupees put it in the stock market but someone doesn't really understand the soft stock market so I'm saying

[00:40:45] put it in the sense x 30 which are the top 30 companies in India and choose infrastructure so the one or two companies in infrastructure put it in that what would you make here three four percent if that five percent maximum I don't know you might lose five percent you

[00:41:09] might make five percent well there you'll make 25 percent you lose five percent on currency 20 percent you still have 20 percent and if you do a really bad job you make 10 percent you still make more exactly okay brilliant so on that note of giving us the hope of earning money

[00:41:32] in becoming rich and how to on it we have a section called high five India okay I'm going to ask you five questions rapid fire we can give a little bit longer answer as well and then your reward is a

[00:41:47] high five from me great I hope you look forward so India for you in one word mother India and one sentence okay what is the one thing about India that the people living abroad cannot understand

[00:42:14] or have a misconception about well it depends on the people and before they visit India they have one they have different thoughts to when they visit India and some people love the the mixture the colors and the dirt and the chaos chaos the chaos and some people

[00:42:36] love it some people hate it some people love it so you have in your in your in your files but what is the one misconception that you can so suppose there was someone who

[00:42:47] who or let me rephrase it and say the one misconception you think you would like they do not have a redress they actually don't remember because they haven't read most of them

[00:43:03] have read history that India ruled the world India in 1700 had a GDP of 23 percent of world GDP it was third place where muslims and plots and diamonds and rubies came from the expertise was way up there compared to the west but it's all gone

[00:43:36] and and and they don't see that that's in our genes it will come back I think you've said it in the brook as well the entrepreneurship is in the genes entrepreneurship in the gene and leadership is in our genes not in leading the world politically

[00:43:56] but leading in every sector and you see that when you get give opportunity to Indians in the in the states four of the top 10 CEOs in the states are Indian top 10 paid CEOs okay number two gets 150 million dollars a year for example which Indian city represents the

[00:44:24] future of innovation and why well if it's technical innovation bangalore is pretty good but there are others catching up there's a hub in Delhi there are hubs everywhere if it's architectural and others is Gujarat and actually I'm not up with what what is going on everywhere

[00:44:49] but I think the infrastructure spent that is happening is going to make um into pretty vibrant by the way I mentioned GST and infrastructure to you and there's a connection when GST started a few years ago the central government was getting eight to 10 billion

[00:45:15] dollars a month today they're getting 20 billion dollars a month that extra 10 billion is going to places like infrastructure you can that's where the money's coming from if you could go back in time and meet a historical person maybe in India or Britain

[00:45:38] or in the British right who is it going to be if you were to swap and what would you do honestly I haven't thought of this I think the the Turkish Empire which was a 500 year empire

[00:46:01] from about the 12th century and 13th century to the 17th 18th century but early on their leaders were amazing I've been watching some soap it's historical so Osman and people like that they built builders I'd love to see that

[00:46:24] meet builders build countries India and I said India and British and the British right so you any of those I thought anywhere in history no no so if you watch let me repeat

[00:46:37] the question because you'll have to take this again so if you were to meet or swap you can choose places with one historical figure either Indian or in the British Raj who would it be and why I think the emperors of old like Ashoka

[00:47:02] hmm be amazing to meet them um what would you ask now just how their mind worked you know because they had some work and people I know Shah Jahan had work on the books of the Taj but the Ashoka Pillar it's made of iron it doesn't rust

[00:47:29] something that that we've lost the guys who ran Nalanda University they would be worth I mean because people from China and all parts of Asia came to study that

[00:47:46] but to lot of those kind of people to a lot of people who say that before the British there was no India and you lived the fact that India had a greater GDP not a greater GDP the quarter of the

[00:48:00] world GDP yes so what would you say to them there are no other facts but it was just princely states and it was a British united them no it didn't matter the the might have been princely states but

[00:48:18] but the knowledge and wealth that was there in India was amazing okay a person one who's the one person who has been most influential to you in your life and you would remember when

[00:48:34] you are at a low point oh no there'd be many people who've been influential the first one who was influential was a gentleman called Justice Hidathpila he later became the chief justice of

[00:48:52] India and vice president of India but I spent a year with him in his house because my parents were transferred out from Delhi to Prague and I was doing Massimi Cambridge that year and they

[00:49:05] said the nation can stay with us so he was I think he had brain power that was quite high certainly higher than mine and he would I had to do I had to get a first division you know

[00:49:24] in its senior Cambridge in ISC and I was a third division kind of guy and I got a first division so in one year it's not bad oh that's interesting at at just this is an extra question but at a very you you must have

[00:49:46] everyone goes through setbacks and in very low point when you don't think something is working where do you get your drive from to move further what what is it in you optimism how do you get that optimism when you're depressed the glass half empty or the glass half

[00:50:07] full I think the glasses are always half full optimism and if you can do it I can do it you know that's brilliant we can do a high five there you are and before I leave I must ask you

[00:50:27] you have the India and the China question you have several points in time in your book compared and contrasted and you said that 50 years will be China this year and now the coming

[00:50:42] is out of India why not China now or how would you compare the two China now China century yeah well this is the bet I'm certainly not going to be around in the next 50 years okay if we compare India and China in terms of opportunities for investment

[00:50:59] China is a GDP of 17 and a half 18 trillion dollars India is a three and a half to four trillion dollars in 1992 China and India were the same look how China has done versus India and and that's their politicians versus our politicians and our civil servants

[00:51:29] so I think they've done many things right many good things for their people in in 30 to 50 years incomes of the Chinese have gone up seven times but what happened is India if you compare you're still saying

[00:51:57] it's better to we're talking about the future not now from 1990 to now yes I'm talking about China what they've done yeah but going forward you don't show so much confidence when you to grow from 18 trillion dollars is much harder than to grow from four trillion dollars

[00:52:23] percentage wise four to eight is a hundred percent right 18 to 36 is a hundred percent they have to grow another 18 so in terms of investment where would you say one would invest

[00:52:40] I would always go with it why because it's easier to grow looks easier from easier to grow yeah as you mentioned one don't honestly last one that democracy the question about that democracy is dying in India or the fact the institutions have been in difficulty

[00:53:03] you have a full chapter on it what is your take you have to have priorities when running a country I'm sure I mean when I run a business I have priorities and that's how I look at the country

[00:53:17] as well the first thing's first get your two to three to four hundred million people who don't have running water and exit that religion and democracy and all these sovereignty and all this

[00:53:33] need to be done but they are not the priority this is the priority the next is education and jobs the young people that are coming out because the young generation needs seven million

[00:53:46] jobs a year seven million new jobs a year need to be done I'm doing it sorry they need to do it so once you got all this sorted you can look at democracy because democracy has been there

[00:54:03] while the Congress ran in deaf for 60 years and where were we people 400 million people without water and electricity no one cared about them everything farmers would excuse their loans so votes work I mean I'm not saying it's not happening now I'm just telling you that there's a

[00:54:27] priority system and we should not judge from here what they should do that we are we're not armchair colonials like the British telling us what to do we're doing the same thing please let them be let them run their own on thing they're doing a good

[00:54:50] job you can see it in the figures brilliant on that note thank you so so very much it's been absolutely a pleasure talking to you it's been an absolute pressure and I really hope that following your advice many people including me will become millionaires

[00:55:07] I thought you were one I am indeed thank you ever so much the next year and now all we have to do is apply the knowledge and the fantastic tools that the next year has given and make ourselves rich

[00:55:23] thank you for being on India story in the making please follow the channel as they say this helps us to get better and bring better guests to you and make it bigger if you can with your

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[00:55:46] please follow and leave your feedback tell us who else you want on the show thank you take care and god bless listen to my podcast audio on apple spotify binge bots or wherever you get your

[00:55:59] podcast from and watch the video of the podcast on my youtube channel levina tundin new episodes are out every sunday