Anupam- The Dreamer

I recently finished watching “Srikanth” movie. This movie is a classic, and one of its own kind in many ways. The protagonist is a visually challenged person, who fights through all odds in his life, at every stage, to get entry into school, into the prestigious MIT in the USA and then starting his own entrepreneurial venture “Bollant Industries”. There are several moments of joy, wonder and motivation, which will not only make you happy but at the same time will leave you moist-eyed. But, what stands out the most for me in this movie was his spirit of never ever giving up! Noone was willing to give a job to Srikanth, despite being meritorious and despite having qualified from the prestigious MIT. It was then, he envisioned to start his own company. And yes he did and did it with great success!

This reminds me of another story which celebrated the same spirit of “never ever giving up” which I studied many years ago. That story was so incredible that it became part of a HRD training programme on motivation in a renowned institute known for its human resource management programme i.e. XLRI, Jamshedpur. And I got an opportunity to be a part of this programme as part of 1 week management development programme especially designed by XLRI for the TATA Steel new joinees in Jamshedpur. This was the story of a senior executive in TATA Steel, and it was called “The heroes of Merchant Mill” (मर्चेंट मिल के सिकंदर).

Before telling the story, a brief background of steel industry would help to set the context. In very simplified terms, the iron ore, coal, limestone are used to make molten iron in blast furnace. Molten iron (at about 1500^oC) is processed into molten steel which is then cast into billets. These billets are then fed into the mills like “merchant mill” to make rebars or “सरिया”, which is used in construction of homes, buildings, roads etc. It so happened that “Merchant Mill”, which was one of the several mills in the big TATA Steel plant, started running into deep losses and hence the senior management decided to shut down and sell off this mill to another company. It was a tough decision for TATAs, as it endangered the livelihood of hundreds of workers working in the mill.

The final decision rested on a gentleman of great courage and candour, the unsung hero whose name was never revealed to us in the case study at XLRI. This person had a unique reputation of turning around the tasks assigned to him, and was known to never ever give up. So, lets call him Mr. Fighter. A delegation of another company came to visit the mill for finalizing the business deal of buying the mill. During their visit, Mr. Fighter stopped their way and exclaimed in front of his team of workers “This merchant mill is not for sale. Please go back from where you have come” (ये मर्चेंट मिल बिकेगा नहीं। आप जहाँ से आये हैं वहीँ चले जाइए।)

Everybody was in deep shock and there was a pin-drop silence. The visiting delegation was dejected, and the workers whose livelihood stood in danger, were surprised but saw a ray of hope in Mr. Fighter’s words. After the delegation went back, Mr. Fighter turned back to address his hundreds of workers. The speech by Mr. Fighter is remarkable in the annals of biggest corporate turnarounds ever seen. Mr. Fighter exclaimed (pardon me for using Hindi because he addressed the workers in Hindi)- “जिस मर्चेंट मिल को मैनेजमेंट ने बेचने की ठान ली है, मैं उसे बिकने नहीं दूंगा। ये मिल अभी बहुत घाटे में चल रही है। हमें इसे नयी टेक्नोलॉजी को अपनाकर वापस मुनाफे में लाना होगा। इंसान की ज़िन्दगी में एक ही बार ऐसा मौका आता है, जब उसे अपने आप से ही बेहतर कर गुज़रना होता है। और हमारी ज़िन्दगी में ये मौका आज आया है। अब ये आप सबको फैसला लेना है कि हम इस मिल को मरने नहीं देंगे और जी जान से इसे दोबारा खड़ा करेंगे। क्या आप सब मेरा साथ देंगे ?”

This speech did wonders! It made the phoenix rise from the ashes in the hearts, minds and souls of the workers! They believed in their leader and in their own hardwork and decided to put every ounce of their energy behind his vision. The senior management was gracious enough to bear the cashburn for few more months, seeing the track record of Mr. Fighter in making the successful turnarounds. And what could be the result of this hardwork???? Within a year, with the fighting spirit and hardwork, this mill made a turnaround completely. It started breaking its own records every month on month, and soon turned to be profitable. This turnaround was about nothing but blood, sweat, toil and tears! And the basic reason for this? The fighting spirit of one man that he will not let the mill shut down!

Sometimes, it is this very spirit of never ever giving up that only counts. Rest, everything falls in place if it has to be. And even if doesn’t, this spirit shouldn’t wither away, because whenever a wonderful thing happens in this world, somewhere, somehow and in some measure this spirit is always present.

Till next time…..