by Sonu Bhasin
Kesar Singh used his authority to lay down some business guidelines as well. His sons had worked hard to grow their businesses in their respective cities. Each son had trusted professionals by his side to help him with the business. This arrangement worked well for them as it allowed them to achieve a work–life balance.
The business model set by Kesar Singh was followed by each of his sons. The shareholding of each working partner was as high as 20–50 per cent in his respective business. This was possibly one of the earliest models of profit sharing, set up in the early 1900s, for professional managers.
The story of how the brothers found the working partners is interesting. Kesar Singh and his large family lived in a bungalow on Race Course Road in Amritsar. Kesar Singh’s wife was a woman of means, of good social standing, and was now the matriarch of a family that was known for their business and philanthropy. At the time, powerful and rich families were visited by women from the city, seeking favours. The bungalow had a large lawn which Bibi Rup Kaur used as her ‘durbar’! ‘My grandmother would wear a loose jabba [flowy garment] that had seven or eight pockets,’ said Surjit Singh. Each pocket would have dry fruit. Sitting on a charpoy, with women squatting in front of her, she would take some dry fruit out of her pocket and hand it to the women speaking. In the winters the women would sit in the sun, and in the hot months the durbar was held under the shade of the trees. Most women would ask for help for the men in their families. ‘My son has just finished his studies and he needs a job’; ‘My nephew is unhappy with his seth and wants another job’; ‘Please find my husband a job outside Amritsar. I want to get away from my mother-in-law’. Some of these men who were referred by their womenfolk ended up working for the Dhingra men at their various shops and outlets. A smaller subset became working partners after they earned the trust of their employers.
While the professionals were called the working partners, Kesar Singh and his sons were known as the owner partners. All investment into the business by way of purchase of shops, warehouses and other assets was done by the owner partners. The Dhingras were paid rent by the business for the properties used in the business. The working capital required for day-to-day operations, including stock and inventory, was also provided by the owner partners and interest was paid to them by the business for the funds loaned. The profits, after netting off all the costs, were shared between the working and the owner partners and were proportional to their predetermined share. The arrangement worked well and suited both parties. The better the business did, the higher was the profit that came to the working partners. The working partners understood this model well and worked hard to grow the business.
‘The working partners were the backbone of the family business,’ said Kuldip, ‘and the owner partners depended on their working partners both for the growth of the business as well as for their own work–life balance. Kesar Singh’s sons would come into their shops each day and work till the afternoon. After lunch, around late afternoon, they would go to the club and play tennis, squash or cards,’ said Kuldip with a delighted laugh. ‘The day-to-day business was run largely by the professionals and it prospered largely due to them,’ he said.
Niranjan Singh continued to run his share of the inheritance. He was happy that he had been given the first shop in Amritsar—the 1898 shop as it is called by the family—as part of his share. This shop, set up by his father and grandfather, was close to his heart. ‘Our family is the true inheritor of the family business,’ said Kuldip proudly. ‘The first shop was where the whole business started. My father was given that shop and this means that he was the one who was taking the business forward from that shop.’
The 1898 shop continued to provide for his family after Niranjan Singh’s untimely death and enabled Sohan Singh to buy the second shop that his grandfather had set up in Amritsar. The two shops were the foundation of the Dhingra family business as it exists today. These shops held Niranjan Singh’s family up when they returned to Amritsar. It was as if the spirits of the forefathers beckoned Kuldip and his family to Amritsar, much like how the city had beckoned his ancestors from Multan.
1961–64
‘Kuldip loves the outdoors and adventures. We have had many holidays in the mountains’—Jaspal Singh Sawhney, chairman, Eagle Group, and a friend of Kuldip Dhingra.
Eight
‘Our Life Changed in Amritsar’
In 1961, four years after Niranjan Singh’s death, his family decided to move from Delhi to Amritsar.
‘We used to cry when we moved to Amritsar from Delhi,’ said Gurbachan Singh Dhingra. ‘Our Amritsar house was a rented one, it was small, there was no air conditioner, no park for us to play in. We had no friends.’
‘You were living a good life in Delhi,’ I said, sipping the delicious nimbu pani made from fresh lemons from the Dhingra farm. It was a hot day but I was enjoying the view of the sunlit lawns from the air-conditioned comfort of Kuldip Singh Dhingra’s lounge. ‘What made you leave Delhi?’ I continued.
Kuldip took a sip of his coffee and shrugged, saying, ‘No one asked us. My brother was the eldest and the word of the eldest was law in our house. Sohan bhapa believed it would be best for the family, so we moved.’
Kuldip was in class 10 at Delhi Public School in 1961. ‘While we didn’t have to appear for the dreaded class 10 board exams—they became part of the system only after 1977—classes 10 and 11 were important even then as admission to college depended on the marks we got in class 11.’ he said.
The need for Kuldip to get into a school was more urgent than for Gurbachan and Ashi who were still in junior and middle school. Surjit Kaur, Kuldip’s mother, belonged to Amritsar and her relatives—brother and his family—still lived there. She reached out for their help to get her children admissions into good schools.
‘I got into St Francis School, one of the oldest Jesuit educational institutions in Punjab set up in 1953. Since I was in class 10 I had to join immediately. I moved to Amritsar and stayed with my mamaji (mother’s brother) until the rest of the family moved to Amritsar,’ Kuldip said. His cousin was in the same class as he was in school.
As Kuldip spoke, there was not even a trace of resentment or frustration in his voice. The fact that he had to leave his family as a fourteen-year-old and live with others didn’t bother him. ‘I don’t bother with small things like these,’ he dismissed my question with an impatient wave of his hand. ‘I only focus on what is important and I get on with it,’ he said assertively. The focus for the young teenager, who still looked upon himself as the man of the house even after his elder brother had returned, was studies and making sure that the siblings also studied. ‘I knew that education was important and without it none of us would be able to move ahead,’ he said.
Kuldip’s other focus was to look out for his elder brother. ‘My brother was a gentle person, almost like a saint,’ he said. ‘I was the street-smart one and my brother depended on me for many things.’ The brother had depended on Kuldip to make the transition from Delhi to Amritsar as smooth as possible for the family.
The family home on Race Course Road in Amritsar had been sold off and Sohan Singh had to look for a house to rent for the family. He found a double-storey house, which came at a steep rent of Rs 300 per month. ‘There was no lawn, it was small,’ said Gurbachan. ‘Although it was a new construction, it was a badly made house,’ he continued.
Gurbachan, who was eleven years old, and Ashi, who was nine, had to go through various tests and interviews to get their seats in the school. They were also finding it difficult to adjust to the new life. ‘We were used to air conditioners and there was only a fan in Amritsar. Bahut garmi lagti thi [We felt very hot] but what to do? We had to get used to it,’ Gurbachan said. ‘Even the toilet was Indian style and did not have the WC that we were used to,’ he complained.
Ashi also had her own set of problems. Living with brothers in cosmopolitan Golf Links, she would usually wear T-shirts and shorts. ‘I did the same in Amritsar in all my
innocence—I would wear my shorts and T-shirt and go to the Mall Road with my cousins. To my horror everyone would stare at me. People in Amritsar were not used to seeing a girl wearing boys’ clothes! I was called mahi-munda, which means a girl pretending to be a boy,’ she laughed.
Gurbachan and Ashi are able to laugh today as they remember their days in Amritsar; but back then they were not happy. They used to cry a lot initially. ‘But we had a full family from my mother’s side there. So we quickly made friends and had loads of cousins and maasis and mamas,’ said Ashi.
Kuldip, on the other hand, saw things differently. He does not remember complaining about the move. ‘I was aware that my brother had made the decision and I believed that it must be for everyone’s good,’ he said. He also remembers the house they moved into differently from his younger siblings. ‘It was a brand new house and we were the first occupants,’ he said happily. ‘The rent was a bit high but we managed it as we had rented both floors of the Golf Links house in Delhi,’ he explained. Each floor of their Golf Links house was rented for Rs 400 per month. ‘Of the Rs 800 per month, we spent Rs 300 on rent in Amritsar and that still left us Rs 500 to manage for the month,’ Kuldip said with pride.
Kuldip’s net worth today is over Rs 30,000 crore. As of 2018, the Dhingra brothers—Kuldip and Gurbachan—were among the twenty-four richest families in Asia.
The family had spent all their savings in paying for the second shop in Amritsar. They had paid some money up front to the uncles—Harbhajan Singh and Kartar Singh—and now had to pay the balance in instalments; the equivalent of EMIs had to be paid every month. ‘We had to be very careful with the money,’ remembered Gurbachan. ‘Mummy looked after us very well but the rule was kharcha karna hee nahin hai [no spending money],’ he continued. ‘That habit stays even today. I cannot spend money phizool mein [unnecessarily],’ Gurbachan shared.
Arvind, one of his golfer friends concurred. ‘Gurbachan does not want to pay the caddie more than one hundred rupees,’ he laughed. ‘We all tease him about it. But he says it is phizool kharch [unnecessary expense] and he will not do it.’
Not just Gurbachan, Kuldip is also still careful about spending money. This approach of ‘conserve the capital’ is evident in the way he guides Berger Paints today.
Kuldip, his siblings and their mother slowly got used to the Amritsar life. The two shops did good business once Sohan Singh was there to supervise the working partners. One shop, the older 1898 one, was left for the working partners to manage. They had been running it since 1957 after Niranjan Singh had died suddenly. Sohan Singh continued that arrangement but would drop into the shop every few days to remind the working partners that the owners were back in Amritsar.
Sohan Singh focused his own attention on the other shop, the one bought from his uncle, which was in Hall Bazaar. Not happy being just a shopkeeper he wanted to set up a factory to manufacture paints. But he needed money for this and Surjit Kaur kept everyone on a financial tight leash.
‘But you said that the business was doing well. Why was money short?’ I asked Kuldip.
‘Although we now had two shops, we also had working partners who had a share in the profit,’ explained Kuldip.
The two working partners were given new terms for profit sharing as there were now two shops instead of just one. ‘They were told that their share in the profit from both the shops would be 15 per cent each instead of the 25 per cent each from the single shop,’ said Kuldip. To be fair to the honest working partners, there was a minimum guarantee given as well.
‘They were told that whatever profit they were earning at that time would be protected, should the 15 per cent be lower,’ Kuldip said. It was either the base amount of their then-current earnings or 15 per cent of the profit of the two shops, whichever was higher. ‘The 15 per cent was much higher than the 25 per cent of the one shop,’ said Kuldip, adding that the working partners had got a ‘damn good deal’!
Nine
‘High School Is Good Enough for a Shopkeeper’
The desire to start manufacturing was burning bright in Sohan Singh. He was the only child among the siblings old enough to understand the loss of the factory after the death of his father. He also remembered the advice the officer who had first offered him a job had given him while advising him to reject the offer! It was reiterated by his wife, Amrit Kaur.
The Dhingra family had welcomed Amrit Kaur, a girl from a textile business family of Bombay, into their family as the eldest bahu. ‘In fact, it was my father who had suggested the rishta for Sohan bhapa,’ grinned Surjit Singh. Kartar Singh and Amrit Kaur’s father were neighbours and friends in Bombay. Over a game of cards one evening, when Kartar Singh heard that his friend was looking for a groom for his daughter, he thought of his nephew, Sohan. It helped that Amrit’s sister was already married into an Amritsar family that was known to Kuldip’s family.
‘My brother did not meet my bhabhi till the engagement,’ said Kuldip. ‘Sohan bhapa asked us, “How can I say no to a girl after meeting her?’’ Photo-phootoo dekh kar hi haan kar diti [He said yes after seeing her photo].’
Sohan, ever the gentleman, agreed to marry Amrit Kaur on the premise that his uncle would choose wisely for him.
He met his future wife for the first time at the Ashoka Hotel in Delhi when she came for the engagement ceremony. Amrit Kaur’s entire family had travelled to the capital by train.
‘As the train neared Delhi, my aunt kept telling me to change my chappals. She kept telling me to wear heels,’ chuckled Amrit Kaur.
We were sitting in her room at the Golf Links house, where the family of the eldest son of Niranjan Singh still lives. Amrit, all of five feet three inches, had not known that her fiancé was over six feet tall! ‘When I saw him at the station I was stunned,’ she laughed and added, ‘I looked up . . . and further up . . . and still further up . . . he was so tall! That’s when I understood why my aunt kept telling me to wear heels.’
After the wedding, Amrit Kaur moved to Amritsar. Although she found things in Amritsar different from Bombay, she soon took charge of the house. It helped that she had an outgoing personality. Sohan Singh was from Modern School in Delhi and then IIT, Kharagpur. The other business families looked up to him. Amrit Kaur belonged to a wealthy and well-known business family of Bombay. The Amritsar business society accepted the young couple. As their social circle expanded, Sohan and Amrit started hosting parties. The house was small but it became the hub for many friends.
Kuldip remembered his Amritsar days with fondness. Unlike his younger siblings, Kuldip did not take much time to settle down in his new life. A born leader, he quickly made a place for himself at school. ‘I was good in studies as well, so everyone looked up to me,’ said Kuldip with a boyish grin. And there were sports—table tennis, badminton and swimming. Kuldip made many new friends through these games.
The house the Dhingras had rented in Amritsar was opposite Hindu College. A sports club of the college stood across the road. It gave Kuldip access to the sports facilities and he made full use of it.
‘There was a nala (drain) separating the club and our house,’ remembered Kuldip. He discovered the sports club by accident. He would see boys coming to the building across the nala every evening. Naturally curious, the teenager ambled across the nala one day and went into the building. He saw some older boys playing table tennis and asked if he could play as well. The older boys stopped playing, looked at each other and then at Kuldip. One of the boys, perhaps wanting to indulge the young boy, told him to play with them. Some of the other older boys smirked and waited for Kuldip to make a fool of himself.
‘I took the racquet and started playing with one or two of the older boys,’ said Kuldip. The others watched, impressed. ‘Bas uske baad [after that], it was they who would call me every day to play,’ he laughed.
Some of Kuldip’s earliest friendships are rooted in Amritsar. Bishan Singh Bedi is one such friend he made through the sports club. Bishan was a slow-arm ortho
dox bowler and part of the famous Indian spin quartet in the late 1960s and 1970s. He went on to lead the Indian cricket team for many years. Back then he was just one of the boys in Amritsar.
‘I remember Bishan was one of the very few who had a scooter in those days,’ said Kuldip. ‘It was one of those Fantabulous Scooters—one that had a pushbutton start.’
There was awe in Kuldip’s voice as he spoke of Bishan Singh’s scooter. It was evident that anyone who could buy a scooter had more money than the Dhingras. Bishan would park his scooter in front of the Dhingras’ house and then walk to the club. The parking of the scooter led to a friendship which still endures.
Bishan himself remembered those days in Amritsar fondly. He belonged to, what he said was, a humble family. Even though his father was the president of the District Congress Committee, they lived a middle-class life. ‘When my father died, I looked into his bank account for the first time. The account had Rs 37.50, and I was not surprised,’ said Bishan.
The would-be cricketer was marginally older than Kuldip but at that age a few years’ age difference could mean a lot. Bishan said their relationship deepened when Kuldip was in college in Delhi.
‘But even back in Amritsar I could tell that Kuldip would go far in life. He had a good understanding of business. He also had a ruthless streak when it came to business,’ said Bishan in his trademark crisp voice. We were sitting in Bishan’s friend’s office in Delhi.
‘Ruthless? How do you mean?’ I asked him. ‘Ruthless for business is good,’ said Bishan. ‘To succeed you have to be a bit ruthless, don’t you think so?’ he asked me.
This is a quality that most people who know Kuldip identify as one of his key traits. He is ruthless about winning. However, winning at all costs does not mean using unfair means. ‘Galat cheez nahin karni hai. Kabhi kari bhee nahin hai [One shouldn’t use unfair means. I have never done so],’ said Kuldip. ‘But I don’t play to lose. I only play to win,’ he added seriously.