Excerpts from “Cactus & Roses - An Autobiography" (1982) by the renowned industrialist Shri S L Kirloskar back to Home
Page ii: “I have frequently referred to my parents and my two uncles because they greatly inspired me. I found in my three brothers—Rajaram, Prabhakar and Ravi—and in my other colleagues Shambhuanna Jambhekar, Anantrao Phalnikar and my two cousins Shankarbhau Kirloskar and Nana Gurjar, a group who not only shared my thoughts but devoted themselves fully to the Kirloskar Organization. My friend and counsellor Lala Shri Ram, helpful statesmen like Shri. T. T. Krishnamachari and Shri. Manubhai Shah also deserves special mention.”
Page 181-184: “EXPORT AND GOI; POLITICAL LEADERS AND FIVE-YEAR PLANS: Here I must particularly mention the services of the two Ministers—Mr. T. T. Krishnamachari and Mr. Manubhai Shah—who laid the ground-work for our export promotion and who actively helped to create more and more exports. Often Mr. Manubhai Shah, without waiting for us to go to him, would himself come to us and ask us to voice our problems, after which he would immediately take up those problems and find solutions for them. Such initiative cut through many of the official procedures and gave us solutions much earlier than one could have otherwise.
In those days, a number of imports were made in order to satisfy certain demands. These imports had no industrial base and those persons who obtained the necessary licenses enjoyed the high prices that they could get for their imports. The seeking and securing of these import licenses was accompanied by a great deal of rush and corruption. Importers of dry fruits and similar articles made a lot of money on them. Noting this, I pointed out to Mr. Manubhai Shah how we exporters of machinery and engineering products, who were acquiring foreign exchange for the Government of India, were suffering losses in contrast to the importers of things like dry fruits - which they paid for from the very exchange provided by our sacrifices! I suggested that the minister might consider granting import licenses for dry fruits to the exporters of engineering products, in proportion to the volume of their exports, so that they might recoup some of their losses on the export of engineering goods from the profit from imported dry fruits. This suggestion appealed to Mr. Shah who gave effect to it for some time. After his departure, however, the import lobby brought their influence to bear on the ministry and managed to restore the status quo ante with consequent profit to themselves and loss to exporters like us. …….
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Although we had made a beginning of export risk insurance in India, our premium rates were forbiddingly high, because of which our enterprises lost heavily on their exports (KOEL lost huge amounts for ten years). I reminded the GOI that along with the increase in exports, a concomitant increase in imports was inevitable; exporters should, therefore, be given a portion of the foreign exchange they earned to enable them to import their needs. Selling in international markets was so expensive, I stressed, that unless the GOI helped our exporters financially, no single Indian enterprise could stand up to the industrial giants of the advanced countries with whom we had to compete. In short, I did my best to persuade the GOI to help exporters in every possible way.
The GOI accepted a number of my recommendations and acted upon them. Let me here note that the development of Indian industry owes most to Mr. T. T. Krishnamachari and Mr. Manubhai Shah, the Ministers for Commerce and Industry. Those who followed these two, were not up to the mark and proved less of a help and more of a hindrance to our industry. Meanwhile, on our side I intensified my efforts. After ten long years we could hardly cover our costs of export promotion; however, rather than slowing down to save expenses on exports, I decided to spread our efforts over wider areas and build a sizable business of foreign sales. ………
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I realised that most of the Indian political leaders had lost sight of the significance of the world economic development and of India’s opportunity to benefit from it. I had several occasions to talk with such persons and found that whenever I mentioned the necessity of speeding up our economic development, they tended to react according to their respective political beliefs. Some wanted to establish a socialist order in India, others insisted that Mahatma Gandhi’s idea of ‘Ram Rajya’ was the only way for India’s survival. Whichever school of thought they belonged to, they obstructed our progress for their own political advantage and to the detriment of India’s economic growth. In fairness, I must note the exceptions of Prime Minister Nehru, Ministers Manubhai Shah and T. T. Krishnamachari, the only leaders who, to some extent, recognised the scope and significance of the changes taking place in the advanced countries; they wanted to accept, adopt and absorb the contents of the new developments and favoured India’s rapid industrialisation.”
Page 194: “EXPANDING AND DIVERSIFYING; NEW VENTURES: The 1960s were a period of considerable expansion and diversification for us along with growing export-promotion. In all this we received help and encouragement from the two ministers with whom we were particularly concerned, Mr. T. T. Krishnamachari and Mr. Manubhai Shah. These two would frequently go out of their way to cut through the normal procedures, so that often their mere assurance was sufficient for us to go ahead with our work”
Page 202-04: “CELEBRATING MY BIRTHDAY: In the midst of all this bustling expansion, my friends decided to celebrate my birthday in 1964. Although Westerners would call this my “Sixty-First” (I was born in 1903), our Indian practice of including the occasion of the person’s actual birth made it the ‘Sixty-Second’. Strictly speaking, both practices are incorrect, since no mortal can be born again. What we celebrate, whether in the East or in the West, is the person’s birth anniversary. Leaving aside such refinements of terminology, let me tell the story of how my friends sought to honour me on my completion of sixty-one eventful and I hope usefully spent years in this world.
After hearing the plans proposed, I promised to submit to all the speech-making and the customary laudatory references, provided that the occasion should in some way or other promote and forward the interests of our business. At that time our top priority was export promotion. We, therefore, invited our distributors and dealers, with their wives, from 28 different countries of the world. The gathering of citizens from so many countries, ranging from Africa to Australia to Canada, attracted international attention. Our guests were shown all the Kirloskar plants in addition to non- Kirloskar plants in which they were interested. Their visit ended with a show for textile export promotion and a farewell dinner in Bombay, at which Mr. Manubhai Shah, then India’s Minister for Trade and Commerce, was the chief guest.”
SLK thanks Shri Manubhai Shah, Chief Guest at the Farewell function to the foreign Distributors, 1964