Taking Stock of Life

Rakesh Agarwal sat in his home office looking over the due diligence his son had managed on a proposed new company acquisition. It was excellent and thorough work and his heart swelled with pride at the thought Ravi would eventually be capable of taking over the conglomerate his extended family owned with him as the senior member of their clan. The family all looked up to Rakesh for final clearance on decisions in their life and prosperity of the extended family through their extensive corporate investments. It was the way society they moved in worked and sometimes Rakesh found it stressful dealing with not only overall corporate affairs which were extensive but also arbitrating between members of the extended family who happened to be at war at the time. His doctor had told him he had to find ways to reduce stress levels and given him an ultimatio if he didn’t change his lifestyle making time for exercise and recreation he’d be in trouble with his health.

That was not to say the full burden of corporate decisions rested on him alone. Family members oversaw mills and other enterprises spread around India and in most cases, they were very competent with their master’s degrees in various disciplines and in some cases PhD degrees from abroad.

Occasionally Rakesh had to intervene where a relative was not performing and maneuver to have them replaced with someone who had skills to drive that subsidiary company, they were responsible for company performance. Rakesh would move the one previously in charge into a different position but that was a delicate operation as no one who had authority could be pushed aside without a loss of face and the resulting intra family war that followed. So, they had to be maneuvered into a new position appearing to be of equal status with the approval of governing boards consisting of members of this branch of the Agarwal clan and with appropriate fanfare singing praises for work done and making it appear the new appointment was an advancement of their status. Of course, everyone knew the real situation but preserving face was of vital importance for peace and harmony within the clan.

But it was not only the stress of being at the pinnacle of the Agarwal empire and having to make final decisions carrying the family with him or the potential for loss of health if he didn’t follow doctor’s orders, but he also had another issue to deal with in his own immediate family.

His father had faced a similar problem with him and had soundly thrashed him in front of his siblings so they too would learn a lesson. That was the way it was in the old days but in today’s world one may not get away with that kind of punishment so easily as societal moods have changed since the days of one’s childhood. Rakesh paused from studying the proposal in front of him to think back on that time.

His father was proud of his Marwari ancestry and insisted that Marwari-Bahasa be always spoken in the home. Yes, the local languages would have to be used at school and in business dealings with people from outside the Marwari community but not in the home or among Marwari people. The proud history of this branch of the clan was to be preserved with its unique culture and religion and proper respect given to the primary saint of their Jain religion Mahavira. This branch of the Agarwal’s were strict observers of the tenants of the Jain religion and Rakesh, and his siblings were punished severely by their father if they were perceived to be lacking in respect for their culture. Their language had evolved from ancient Gujarati and their ancestral place of origin was Rajasthan so they should never forget their heritage.  

So, it was a major event in the family when Rakesh, after completing his undergraduate education let slip, he’d been keeping company with the daughter of an industrialist during the last two years of his studies in school hours and after school. This had been communicated through his siblings to the servants who informed Rakesh’s mother who passed this unwelcome news on to her husband. That was when Rakesh’s father beat him with a stick and confined him to his room while an investigation was commenced into this girl’s background. Her name was Laxmi Biyani, and she was of their Jain community, but it was customary for this branch of the Agarwal’s to seek a wife within the extended Agarwal clan.

The Biyani’s were controllers of one of the private banking systems throughout India with branches in some of the surrounding countries. Money lending and banking had been the traditional work of the Marwari community and they’d prospered from antiquity and particularly during the time of the Raj just as the rest of the Marwari community had done with their mills. Up to the early 1990’s the Marwari communities had controlled twenty four percent of the Indian economy but even though they were still powerful players in industry and banking their share of economic control had fallen to just two percent now.

Rakesh could not recall the number of beatings he’d taken as he found ways to sneak out of his confinement to meet the girl and eventually the girl’s father who was not averse to the attentions of this young man to his daughter sent an inquiry through an intermediary as was the custom to find out what Rakesh’s intentions were as meetings between the two young people were becoming widespread knowledge among the Marwari communities and both families would be compromised by these previous secret meetings now known. If Rakesh did not marry the girl now his reputation would take a hit, and this would impact any feelers the family put out for a suitable wife for their son. In the same manner the girl’s reputation would be spoiled as it was assumed young men and women meeting without family supervision in those days had not followed accepted moral codes.

Rakesh did not know everything that had happened behind the scenes but over time the punishments stopped, and a process commenced for formal meeting between the families and negotiations for dowry began. Then consultations took place to choose an auspicious time for the wedding ceremony which was a major event with no expense spared and a group of the most prominent people in society in attendance.

Rakesh’s mother was delighted with her new daughter-in-law who pulled out all stops to impress her mother-in-law. Nothing was too much trouble, and the elder woman now became Laxmi’s strongest promoter and defender against her husband’s dissatisfaction until eventually he came to love his daughter in law too.

Laxmi was not happy when Rakesh was sent overseas to pursue his master’s degree but by that time was embraced and loved by the family and comforted in her husband’s absence. Soon after Rakesh had commenced his first year overseas Laxmi delivered her first child Ravi. This was an incentive for Rakesh to study hard to finish his master’s degree as he yearned to return to his Laxmi and son Ravi.

On his triumphant return to India, he was given a responsible position as understudy to his father and learned quickly as he observed his father in action. The older man may not have had the advanced education his son had now but by instinct practiced all the things being taught in graduate schools and understood the necessities of surviving in the Indian environment which no graduate school overseas could possibly comprehend.

Rakesh learned quickly and little by little father gave him more and more control over their extensive holdings as a family and the extended family began to look to him as the natural successor extended family head and commenced sending their own sons and occasionally daughters for further education abroad.

They as a community were now competing on the international stage so had to be able to match foreigners academically and practically trained in business and industry. Over the years Laxmi produced other children after her husband’s return from abroad. A daughter Savitri came next followed by son Abhishek and another daughter Lalit. The last delivery almost took Laxmi’s life and the doctor decreed there should be no more children and with the agreement of husband and wife performed a surgical intervention to see that did not happen. But Rakesh and Laxmi were satisfied with their brood and poured their love on them relaxing the stern disciplines Rakesh had endured from his own father who’d now passed away. His frail mother remained but her health had deteriorated, and servants were supplied to look after her every need. Laxmi showered attention on her mother-in-law in appreciation for her support and defense when she first entered the home after marriage. Not all brides in that era were as fortunate as Laxmi.

All these experiences ran through Rakesh’s memory in rapid order, and it led him to the current situation causing him to pause his examination of Ravi’s due diligence report on the proposed new company acquisition. There’d been a gradual change in the kind of business the Agarwal’s had run over centuries. First money lending, then banking, then investment in jute and cotton mills and then the revolution in textile manufacturing using synthetics. Others in the Marwari community had quickly branched into heavy industry and were now gearing up for an invasion of overseas markets with their increasingly sophisticated products. It was interesting to see that slowly as India’s economic might grew, Indian companies were buying up the assets of colonialists in their own countries now. The Marwari community were well represented in this reverse economic colonialism and Rakesh was beginning to look at expansion abroad too. This acquisition would be his first foray into foreign economies if the family boards approved the move. He was proud of his son’s management of this potential acquisition abroad for their family to be presented to family boards for approval.

But this issue was a personal one not a business one and he had to face his son down on the issue. In some ways it was a repeat of his fight to get Laxmi for his wife against a father who followed tradition to a letter. But in his own case it had been a different family clan within the Marwari community and the religion was the same. Ravi’s probable choice of a bride was a much more complex affair, and he was sure the extended family would not be happy although old prejudices were slowly breaking down in the younger generation.

During Ravi’s work assessing the value of this target company they were interested in acquiring abroad he’d worked with the Deloitte team in England to do due diligence on an English multimedia company with a view to possible acquisition. The Agarwal’s were already into that developing industry in India and wanted to buy into some of the cutting-edge work being done overseas to try and become the leaders in India and eventually look at other opportunities in Europe and America.

As one of the team members was of Indian extraction, Ravi naturally gravitated toward her as they worked their way through the process of data collection, analysis, and negotiations. Elizabeth Birla had her PhD in communications and was one of the primary sources of knowledge in the team. Her parents on father’s side had been in England for a generation now. Her father was Indian, but her mother was of the English social elite. Elizabeth possessed an MBA as well so was highly qualified and valued by Deloitte’s. Having completed Deloitte’s work for the Agarwal’s she and another mix of specialties were presently in Dubai for the Deloitte firm working on another project there.  Ravi had come back from the UK enamored with this woman and apparently, she had more than an interest in Ravi. They were in constant contact through messaging and video calls now.

To be continued.

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