| |
BUSINESS:
LUDHIANA
Puppy
Paradise
Lifestyles in Punjab's richest city could put big spenders in the country's
metros to shame
By
Malini Goyal
 |
PARTY
TIME: The Bectors, Cremica Agro-Foods
The Bector family loves to party, as do their peers in the city. It
is normal to spend up to Rs 25 lakh on one bash. |
This
was no royal wedding. But preparations were no less grand. A stadium for
the milni ceremony; 35 Cielo cars lined up to be given away as gifts;
flowers worth a couple of lakhs flown in for decoration; Kumar Sanu performing.
Mumbai would have stopped for such a wedding. Delhi's jaws would have
dropped. But in Ludhiana, the marriage of Kamal Oswal-of Monte Carlo fame-was
just another wedding.
The morning
after. Cut to the university grounds in the city where the rich joggers
foot it out. Parked outside its gates are the latest on four wheels-Pajeros,
Mercs, LandCrusiers, Hondas. If jogger mobility is a barometer of a city's
wealth, then Ludhiana sure is loaded.
Rave parties,
rain dances, celebrity nights, impromptu barbecues-nights are happening
here, weekends full of surprises. Every festival is grand, every occasion
a reason to celebrate. Party talk veers around the latest in Mercs and
BMWs. Call them flashy, call them show-offs. Call them hardworking men
who know how to enjoy life. From driving rickshaws to running a bicycle
company, Ludhiana is full of Puppies-Punjabi upwardly mobile professionals.
Their enterprise has brought to Ludhiana wealth that this city is strutting.
Don't let
the potholed roads or shanties fool you. Ludhiana netted the highest number
of tax assessees (1.06 lakh) under the Government's economic criteria
guidelines. It has the highest per capita cars in India. Expensive brands
like Rado and Bose have many takers here. The rich here spend Rs 50-100
crore during Diwali gambling. The wealth is visible-in palatial houses
and pools, jacuzzis and home theatre systems. Enough to make Citibank
and ABN Amro open full-fledged branches. Children here go to Doon, Sherwood
and Sanawar. Vineet Adya, scion of a hosiery exporting family, echoes
the mood here: "I do not believe in stacking up cash. Those who don't
spend don't have a heart." Adya himself is fond of cars and his latest
acquisition is an S-class Merc.
 |
REVVING
IT UP
VINEET ADYA, RB Knit With a BMW and an S-Class Mercedes, Adya is not
out of place in a city crawling with over 200 imported luxury cars |
While in
terms of wealth, Ludhiana is comparable to many other cities, it is the
free-spending nature of its people that sets it apart. Says S.P. Oswal,
chairman of the Rs 1,800-crore Vardhman Group: "Punjabis are by nature
ostentatious and show off more than what they may have." Says Ajay
Bector of Cremica Agro Foods, a confectionery company: "There is
a race to be better than others." From the most talked about party
to the most expensive dress, their mind constantly wanders to achieve
such superlatives. So you have Jagjit Singh-beating Daler Mehndi night,
a Mercedes one-upping the Lancer in this never-ending game.
Wonder where
all this money comes from? Ludhiana has taken advantage of liberalisation.
As the economy gathered speed, Ludhiana followed in its slipstream and
has been ramping up its industrial capacity. The city has traditionally
been a hub of industrial activity with textile mills, hosiery plants,
bicycle and auto-ancillary companies. It produces over 80 per cent of
India's acrylic fibres, 65-70 per cent of its bicycles and components
and 90 per cent of domestic winter wear. There are as many as 42,247 small-scale
industries and 160 big industries (investment above Rs 1 crore) employing
over 3.2 lakh workers.
There are
other reasons for Ludhiana's prosperity-some geographical, others strategic.
Just five hours from Delhi, it provides all the basic ingredients for
industry to grow and flourish. The city has ample raw materials, enough
migrant workers and virtually no labour problem. Moreover, when terrorism
took a heavy toll of business in places like Amritsar, many successful
businessmen shifted base to Ludhiana.
"There
is genuine entrepreneurship coupled with opportunity," says Oswal.
Hardworking people who are risk taking, receptive to new ideas and who
are ready to learn and adapt make all the difference. Then there is the
cluster advantage-one industry feeding another. A hosiery unit needs raw
materials like fabric, wool, buttons, chains, spinning yarns and so on.
"You are not alone. You have a group progressing with you,"
says Jaswinder Bhogal of the Bhogal Group that manufactures bicycles.
When the Bhogals got into bicycle manufacturing, their relatives set up
bicycle component units. "Punjabis have a good understanding of the
Indian system," says Rajinder Gupta, managing director of the Rs
600-crore Trident Group.
In this
self-evolving interdependent processes, businesses go boom and bust hand-in-hand.
The Russian trade crisis saw scores of companies vanish overnight. But
despite such setbacks, businessmen here have learnt to quickly shift track
and change business with the changing times. For instance, Pran Arora
of Ritesh Industries used to run a vanaspati plant but now has got into
the more successful hosiery business. Gupta, who started with a small
chemicals unit, today has diversified into paper, chemicals and yarn.
"The more the value addition, the more you have to play around with,"
says Gupta.
 |
CANINE
COUNTRY: RITU AULUCK, CR Auluck & Sons
Dog worship isn't cheap. Breeds like the English Mastiff and the St
Bernard cost upwards of Rs 30,000 a pup. |
Despite flourishing
businesses, most of the enterprises in Ludhiana are small and mid-level.
Only a few like the Munjals, Oswals, Mittals, Bhogals and Gupta have made
it big. While the Mittals' Bharti Group has shifted base to Delhi, the
Munjals have shifted a major part of their business to the capital. What
is it that inhibits the growth of big enterprises? One, the very nature
of industry limits them. Hosiery units cater to the fast-changing fashion
industry which has a high turnover. Hence, size is a big deterrent. Second,
the city is not a good place to attract talent, admits Oswal.
Third, and
perhaps most important, most businesses here are family-run. Professionalism
is at a premium, business deals are still not transparent and prosperity
has not trickled down. Migrant workers from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar comprising
over 30 per cent of the city's population earn about Rs 2,500 a month.
Shanty dwellings, ill-maintained shopfloors and lack of basic facilities
blight the affluence. Says a local industrialist: "The companies
haven't bothered to invest in basic facilities for their workers. They
want civic services but don't want to pay for them." No wonder the
prosperous clusters are scarred by islands of poverty.
Also as
B.M. Munjal, chairman, Hero Group and a giant among Ludhiana industrialists,
points out, "While there is a large number of users of civic infrastructure,
the number of those paying tax to the municipal corporation is low."
For now
the absence of trickle down doesn't seem to bother Ludhiana's rich who
are too busy earning their wealth and spending it.
Top
|
|
METRO TODAY
If
planned well, the quake could be the Keynesian opportunity for Yashwant
Sinha to trigger growth, 