These entrepreneurs didn’t need an MBA

Connect The Dots
Rashmi Bansal
Eklavya Education Foundation
306 pages
Rs150
 

Rashmi Bansal’s earlier book Stay Hungry Stay Foolish was about entrepreneurs who had done their MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA). Connect The Dots is about 20 entrepreneurs who did not go to IIMA. Compared to English-speaking MBAs, the non-MBAs are more open, and in some ways, it makes the stories in this volume sound more genuine than those of the MBAs featured in the earlier book.

Take Ranjiv Ramchandani of Tantra T-Shirts, who has turned ‘slogan T-shirts’ into a lucrative business. As Bansal writes, “Ranjiv is candid enough to admit how clueless he was. He recalls applying in response to an ad of British Airways that said ‘Stewardess required.’” 

Or take the case of Prem Ganpathy who runs the Dosa Plaza chain. Bansal writes, quoting Ganpathy (who used to work in a coffee shop in Chennai), “Mera maalik ka ek bhai Bombay se aaya tha 1990 mein. Uske saath main Bombay chala gaya.” The person he came to Bombay with, disappeared, leaving him at Bandra station. How Ganpathy fought back to become an entrepreneur makes for an absorbing read.   

The book profiles several social entrepreneurs. Take Satyajit Singh of Shakti Sudha Industries, who is trying to professionalise the entire supply chain around the production and marketing of makhana, working along the lines of Amul. Makhana is a high protein edible product, 90 per cent of which is produced in North Bihar. Well, how difficult can it be, trying to be an entrepreneur in Bihar? Ask Singh.

Mahima Mehra, the founder of Hathi Chap, makes environmentally-friendly paper. With the help of a local entrepreneur, she has perfected the art of making paper from elephant shit. Right now, she is hard at work trying to make paper from camel shit.

There is also the interesting story of Saurabh Vyas and Gaurav Rathore, graduates of IIT Bombay, who have founded PoliticalEDGE, a consultancy that uses statistical modeling to help politicians forecast their chances of winning an election.

The book contains several well-known success stories such as those of Mumbai’s Crossword Book Stores (R Sriram and his partner of many years Anita), Su-kam invertors (Kunwar Sachdev), Veta English speaking classes (Ganesh Ram) and the electric car Rewa (Chetan Maini).

The book flags a bit towards the end, with the last three profiles being of people who are not really entrepreneurs. One is about a software engineer-turned-wildlife photographer, and another is on a winner of some dance contest. Of these, the story of Paresh Mokashi, who made the acclaimed Marathi film, Harishchandrachi Factory against all odds, makes for an interesting read.

Bansal speaks mostly to the entrepreneurs being profiled and not to the people around him or her. As a result the reader gets a one-dimensional view, based entirely on what the entrepreneur thinks of herself. That weakness apart, this book should be an inspiring read, even for the die-hard salaried class who’ll never let go of their jobs to start something of their own.