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Shiv Khera tells babus to pack a punch, a la Muhammad Ali

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Top officials of four ministries in the Modi government got to know why Muhammad Ali kept winning bout after bout, and what made Michael Phelps so special. Finally, they got a lesson on what catapulted Shiv Khera from being a failed student to becoming a motivational guru.

You too can win was the overriding theme at Vigyan Bhavan on Tuesday. Rural development minister Nitin Gadkari, of late plagued by bugs, was in attendance. So were four secretary level officials, a number of joint secretaries and director-level officials, all of them needing a strong dose of motivation.

And Shiv Khera, India's own international motivational guru, with a bestseller with his name on the cover, was there to give them a pep talk that would make the difference between winning and losing. Babus with years of hands-on experience suddenly made to hear words they read in dictionaries but never found in the files they moved or stalled.

In his usual anecdotal style, Khera threw a question at them, a punch that would wake them up: Tell me, what did Muhammad Ali keep saying when he stepped into the ring? The right answer would fetch a signed copy of You Can Win. A few hands rise. A few words are spoken. Signed copy of You Can Win stayed with Khera.

"Ali says 'I'm champion. I'm the Greatest'. He keeps saying 'I'm champion. I'm the Greatest'. Why does he do that? He's mentally conditioning himself for the fight. He's sending positive vibes. He's pumping himself up to win," says Khera, giving the assembled bureaucrats more than food for thought.

Does that go down well with the babus? Khera doesn't stop to ask that question, he throws in another: "How many golds did Micheal Phelps win? You know he's the swimmer who broke Mark Spitz's record." Several of the babus answer. One of them gets it right: "Eight, right?" He gets You Can Win, signed by winner of them all, Shiv Khera!

It was time to get personal. So Khera throws in the sucker punch, an anecdote right out his life. He tells the bureaucrats of his Modern School days when he failed in seven out of eight subjects, and his teacher, a Mr Kapoor, called his father and told him to his face, "Get your brat out of school, he's spoiling the school record!"

That did not happen. And in 1975 Khera migrated to the United States. There he met an American who asked Khera what he did for a living, and Khera answered with authority: "I sermonise to cars." The American was at a loss. So, Khera dumbed down the answer: "I clean cars!" The American gawked, said: "Boy, you're a master of terminology, let's work together." And Khera retorted, "Why should I get into a Joint Venture, I'm fine working alone'.

Thus ended Tuesday's motivational class for bureaucrats of ministries of rural development, panchayati raj and drinking water and sanitation. "It's Modi's idea," said the bureaucrat who spoke to dna, and who's one of them who was supposed to be motivated enough to remain motivated after the pep talk.

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