Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and flush your mind to meditate, all alone in a room. You are not on a vacation; it’s a spiritual retreat. How long can you meditate? Can you do it every day for 21 days at a stretch?
In early December last year, Gujarat’s pharma czar Indravadan A Modi returned from the Pujya Mota Ashram in Nadiad after spending 21 days in absolute isolation and silence.
This was the 14th year in a row when he had spent some time at the ashram, completely removed from the world outside, connecting with his “soul”. But this was the first time that he felt his “mann (mind) was responding”.
Investing in higher self
Modi’s spiritual quest is a far cry from what one would expect a busy businessman to be doing in the middle of a busy work schedule. He is held in awe and revered by his colleagues, family members and acquaintances.
The value of the time he spends meditating every year would run into crores of rupees but, for the octogenarian industrialist, this time is well invested.
“I do nothing during those days except say ‘Hari Om’ repeatedly,” says Modi, a shy and extremely soft-spoken man. “Trust and faith are the only things (shraddha) that matter. I cannot even begin to describe how it has helped me. Among other things, it has given me courage.”
When he started meditating more than a decade back, he was not confident he would be able to maintain spiritual discipline for such long periods of time. But, somehow, he persisted. He is happy that he can now meditate for 21 days at a stretch which is a feat in itself.
Invisbile hand...of God
“Earlier, I would not be able to concentrate for more than a few hours at a stretch,” he says, as if talking to himself. “But this turned into days. I would think: ‘What am I doing? Am I wasting my time? I will not come back next year.’ But, for some reason, I would return every year.”
Now, he has a schedule so rigorous that it would shock even sportspersons. He wakes up at 3:10 am every day, meditates for three hours, has breakfast at around 8 am and reaches his office by 9:30 am. And, mind you, he’s pretty strict about this. “There’s God in everything. I now feel He has put me on the right track,” he says.
One might ask why a successful businessman like Modi should worry about being on the right track after five decades of stellar accomplishment in the pharmaceutical industry?
The reason is that for Modi, the tough had to get going in the early 50s, as the going had been particularly tough for him at the time.
Cradle days of Cadila
“Ever since I was in school, I wanted to start a business,” Modi says.Cadila Pharmaceuticals was started in 1951 by Ramanbhai Patel and IA Modi who first met each other in high school. Their company had its humble beginnings in Azaad Society in Ahmedabad.
“After studying pharmacy, we started Cadila in the three rooms of a bungalow in Azad society 58 years back,” Modi said. “We gathered Rs25,000 as capital to launch the company. We started in three rooms, with a small vessel and a stirrer, but without any machine or employees. At that time, my wife, grandmother and we two partners used to wash bottles and make syrups. To begin with, we first made a vitamin B12-based tonic.”
Coincidently, 1951 was witnessing a global crisis. “We were rebuked by Patel’s uncle for starting a new venture,” he said. “But despite the global crisis, we had started the company with a working capital of just Rs25,000, and had decided to run it till the capital lasted. I had told my partner that if we ran out of money without making profits, we will start looking for a job,” he said.
The turnover of the company in its very first year touched the figure of Rs1 lakh. “At that time, I used to cycle 40 km every day to meet doctors and deliver bottles to stockists. I also worked as taster and typist for our company,” Modi said, recalling his experiences.
How Bombay was won
Soon the company was supplying medicines in Bombay. In 1967, for the first time, the company’s turnover touched Rs1 crore. “It was then that we decided to set up a factory at Ghodasar and slowly shifted to the new plant,” he said.
For other manufacturing processes, the company needed a machine that had to be imported. “Due to the license-permit raj that prevailed at the time (1975), we did not get approval for it. So we decided to make it ourselves. We set up a company, Karnavati Engineering, which is now making machines for the pharmaceutical industry,” he said.
It took 16 years for Cadila to reach the mark of Rs1 crore as turnover. In the nearly 60 years after the original company split, the turnover of Cadila Pharmaceutical has grown to over Rs800 crore.
“Today, we export medicines to more than 60 countries,” Modi said. “Now, I have a vision that India and, particularly, Cadila should work on new molecules and patent them.”
Mantra behind the name
It was Modi and his partner Patel who coined the word, ‘Cadila’, as the name for their company. “Cadila stands for ‘Chemicals, Analysis, Drugs and Industrial Lab’,” Modi said. “We did not have any vision at the time. With the mantra of ‘Why dream about the future; work for today’, we founded this company.”
The early struggles
People often talk about how Nirma’s Karsanbhai Patel went around on a cycle selling detergent, or how Dhirubhai Ambani, who worked at a petrol pump, was inspired to found a business empire.
But few know that Cadila Pharmaceuticals also began its journey from a tiny three-room tenement in Azaad Society in Ahmedabad, and that an ambitious Modi used to go around town selling medicines on his bicycle.
To save accommodation expenses during business visits to Bombay, bathing was done before dawn in the train toilets of third class compartments used for travelling. “Without spending much time on sleeping or resting, I used to meet people, deliver stock and return the same day,” Modi said.
Cure and care for all
“Way back in the ‘50s when India had just become independent, I felt that if India had to progress, the country could not afford to depend on imported medicines. That was one of the primary reasons why we started a pharmaceutical business.”
Six decades later, the focus has not changed. Cadila has already invested heavily and continues to invest in research in niche areas.
Making HIV drugs cheaper, and manufacturing medicines for diseases endemic to developing economies are the focus areas of the company’s research work.
Those closely involved with the process confidently claim that their facilities are definitely on a par with the best in the country.
The company plans to manufacture a new cancer drug by 2011. “We expect our medicine for cancer to hit the road in the first quarter of 2011. Currently, clinical trials are going on,” Modi told DNA.
Modi, who is the chairman of Cadila Pharmaceuticals, claims that
no other cancer medicine will be as good or successful as theirs. Why a cancer drug? Modi said a medicine for cancer is urgently needed.
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