Sailesh and I were not averse to trying our hand at various businesses and though we failed miserably in the perishables and cattle business, nevertheless we were an optimistic duo. Our Volga Gang was equally game for any business opportunity, so our group was always on the lookout for interesting businesses.

One such opportunity came to us through a broker named Mr Verma. This gentleman had buyers for Fish Maws which apparently were a delicacy abroad and he convinced us that we should identify good suppliers for this item.

Fish Maws are normally used in a dry form and have a spongy texture.

Though I am a vegetarian, I did some research on Fish Maws and found out that it is a much sort after sea food item especially in Southeast Asia and it is one of the 4 sea food delicacies along with abalone, sea cucumber and shark fin that is consumed widely in this region.

Fish Maws was a very difficult item to source and procure and to cut a long story short, we and our group were unable to identify reliable sources. So, one more adventure ended in total failure and was a complete waste of time.

Our next adventure was with handlooms. My father’s friend introduced me to one Mr Wesley Aaron who had a handloom factory in Kerela and was interested in exporting handloom furnishings to Europe. Hence,when we learnt Mr Aaron was visiting Bombay, we arranged to meet with him. He had a Bombay representative, a venerable old Parsi lady who had flat on Wodehouse Road in Colaba in a building called Bennett Villa. We met both of them in this flat where in one room, she had showcased several handloom samples. We procured these samples and sent them to our potential Clients in the Netherlands and to Scandinavian countries like Denmark and Sweden, but predictably no export orders came and in frustration we decided that exporting handloom products was not our cup of tea.

Next came our flirtation with mill made textiles,especially bed sets and made ups which were extensively exported to Western Europe at that time. Our family friend Mr MP Agarwal being a textiles man and an owner of a textile mill along with a Dye House encouraged us in this line of business.

We were introduced to an important executive from Bombay Dyeing who had been their Export Manager for many years and now had recently retired. MrAgarwal was interested in hiring Mr Khambata, the ex-Bombay Dyeing Export Manager, so we promptlyarranged a meeting with the gentleman concerned. MrKhambata told us after the meeting that since he had worked for many years with a large Parsi owned Company like Bombay Dyeing, he was not comfortable joining a Marwadi family-owned enterprise and therefore he declined the Offer.

Nevertheless, Mr Khambata was very nice to us and promised to help us and assist us as much as possible with our fledging business. But again, luck was not in our favour and despite all sincere efforts to make a breakthrough in the export market, all our efforts came to naught. So sadly, we decided to call it a day and look forward to other opportunities. Hence our business journey limped on and soon I will recount our other attempts to make it big in the business world.

In the Bombay of the 70s, it was a common sight to see Arabs and folks from the Middle East come to Bombay during the monsoon season. So, following the introduction from my school classmate Brian Alexander, Sailesh and I met this Arab importer from Bahrain at the Natraj Hotel on Marine Drive. He was a friendly person and after some expected haggling, he placed an order for 23 tons of fresh vegetables including lemons to be shipped to Bahrain. 

This was the easy part as we realized later because it was very difficult to get charter flights to air lift this perishable cargo. Thus began an endless chase to find and persuade cargo airlines to handle our cargo. Our Volga gang tried to help us and, in the process, we met many interesting people as I will narrate now.

 The Arab trader had in the meanwhile issued the Purchase Order to us and opened a transferable letter of credit for the first shipment – I think the value of this was about INR 8 lacs which in the late 1970s was a tidy amount. 

Our Parsi friends Pesi and Cyrus from our Volga group knew the owner the of Cambata Aviation and they promptly took us to meet the owners who had their office atop the Eros Cinema theatre. But unfortunately, they were fully committed to their other shippers and could not accommodate us. Our other friend Naushad Patel, who ran a successful Buying Agency for shrimps and frog legs also tried to assist help but unfortunately nothing happened on that front too!

We now met another interesting character one Mr Joy from Kerela who was in the Export business. He was a slick talking Malayalee who promised to help us if he could transfer the letter of credit to his company. Being rather naïve, we agreed to do so and promptly agreed to transfer the letter of credit and then began the nightmare of chasing Mr Joy and persuading to ship the fresh vegetables. He would give us various excuses whenever we met him but finally the letter of credit expired, and we were left in the lurch. Mr Joy gave us endless sorrow and all our dreams of becoming export tycoons came crashing down.

Nevertheless, Sailesh and I were an optimistic duo and soon another opportunity to export livestock came along. These were Buffaloes to be exported to Saudi and there was a buyer who was interested in giving us this business. We were still in touch with Mr Joy despite the failed attempt to export fresh vegetables and we mentioned to him the possibility of exporting buffaloes to Saudi. He again charmed us and persuaded us to introduce the Saudi buyer to him. We did so foolishly and predictably he was successful in persuading the buyer to place an order on his company. Mr Joy in turn gave us a letter confirming our commission for this deal.

Again, shipping he Buffaloes on a Cattle Carrier had its own challenges but we had the opportunity to go onboard various Cattle Carriers to inspect them in the Bombay Port and see how the livestock was transported but alas to our utter disappointment, Mr Joy was not able to effect the shipment and we were back to square one.

Finally, we heard that Mr Joy was arrested by the Economic Offences Wing as he had swindled many Exporters and was also involved in foreign exchange related rackets. The last thing we heard of Mr Joy was that he was cooling his heels in the police locker at the police headquarters near Crowford Market in Bombay!

So, with my new business partner and erstwhile neighbour, Sailesh my business journey began and what a journey it has been! Our family friend, Mr MP Agarwal had offered us his Mill address which was in Mogul Lane, Matunga to operate from. Using this address, I quickly printed our visiting cards and as mentioned earlier, I had decided to call my Company Argosy which means a ship laden with goods since I was planning to be in the exports business. Also, I wanted a bit of the Greek touch as I remember reading about Jason and the Argonauts from Greek mythology!

Next, I opened my first business account in the Canara Bank which my ancestors had founded – for this I had to go to the Fort Area in Tamarind Lane, and which happened to be one of the oldest branches of the bank in Bombay.

As we did not want to sit in the Mill premises, Sailesh and I spent most of our time visiting various Chambers of Commerce and export promotion agencies trying to meet as many people as we could who could help us in our export business. As Mr Agarwal was a Mill owner and in the textiles business, we decided to focus on textile related products like cotton yarn, grey fabrics, power loom lungis, hosiery t-shirts and cotton made ups as these items had an export market.

During our visits to the Fort Area of Bombay, we accidentally one day entered the office of a travel agent and as it happened, we got into a conversation with the young men in this office who were very friendly! We discovered that they too were engaged in the export business and very soon this common interest made us meet regularly. Two of these people, Pesi Amroliwala and Cyrus Captain soon became our good friends and one day they invited us for a meeting in the Volga restaurant in Churchgate where they used to gather often in the mornings as they knew the owner of the restaurant and they were allowed to sit there till lunch time. Soon this became our impromptu office, and we spent many a pleasant hour drinking coffee and having a sandwich or two!

One day I met my old St Mary’s schoolmate, Brian Alexander and when I told him I was in the export business, he quickly told me that there was an Arab importer currently visiting Bombay who was interested in importing fresh vegetables from India. I discussed this idea and opportunity with my Volga gang of friends, and they immediately said that I should explore this opportunity! My friends had contacts with certain chartering companies who could provide us with charter flights that could airlift fresh vegetables to the Gulf. 

Thus began a new adventure……!

The year was 1976 and I was a graduate, but the future looked bleak and confusing. My father was retiring from the Reserve Bank in 1979 and I was still unemployed. The Sabbath challenge of not being able to work on Saturdays added another challenging dimension in my quest for my career. Nevertheless, I had faith and conviction that I would be able to surmount all these looming obstacles and carve a niche for myself.

My close friend Rafeeq Ellias was a role model for me, and he was an exceedingly good copywriter who had joined in the early 70s Clarion McCann and later spent some years again as a copywriter with an American advertising agency in Tokyo, Japan. Taking a cue from Rafeeq, my heart was set on taking up advertising and copywriting as a possible career for me. Advertising agencies at that in Bombay were foreign agencies and followed a 5-day work week and hence getting a Saturday off was possible!

Luckily, my father’scousin was a director of Phillips India and through him I managed to get an interview appointment at Clarion McCain which had Philips as their Client. Very soon, I was facing Ms Syeda Imam who was then the Creative Director of Clarion and she gave me a copy test. I was told that Clarion would contact me if I passed this copy test- I waited for several weeks but there was no call from Clarion and I soon realized that I was not going to be hired by Clarion and all my dreams of being a copywriter just fell apart! With the Clarion disappointment still fresh in my mind, I was wondering what to do next.

I think the answer came out of the blue- we had a family friend one Mr M P Agarwal who had also converted to Seventh-day Adventism, and he unexpectedly paid us a visit at home. We had lost touch with him as he had gone back to Calcutta where his extended family was based. The Agarwals were Calcutta based Marwaris who were Industrialists and had made it big first in the Mining business and then in Jute & Cotton Textiles- they also owned a Sugar Mill in Mandsaur in Madhya Pradesh. After his return to Calcutta Mr Agarwal had got married and he was asked to take charge of their business interests in Bombay, Surat & Mandsaur. He had known me from the age of 14 and now on his return to Bombay, as I mentioned earlier, I was 25 years old and wondering what to do next. Mr Agarwal suggested that I should try my hand at business and offered to guide me in this direction. He also said that I could use his Mill address in Bombay and look at the possibilities of exporting Cotton Textiles to Europe. I grabbed this opportunity at once and thus began my Entrepreneurial journey towards the end of 1976 / beginning of 1977!

Mr Agarwal was popularly called MP and he had his textile unit- a process house called New Era Fabrics in Mogul Lane, very close to where we used to reside earlier in Mahim. With MP’s encouragement I set up a proprietorship company and I named this Company Argosy which meant ‘a ship laden with merchandise’ as I planned to get into the Export business. The next step was to open a bank account for Argosy and since my relations many years ago had promoted the Canara Bank, I thought it would be appropriate for me to open my first bank account with them. So, I went to their oldest Branch in Bombay in Tamarind Lane in the Fort Area and got myself a current account there!

We lived in Krishna Sadan in suburban Mahim till 1959 and our immediate neighbour on the 1st Floor was the Kottary family- Mrs Kottary was very close to my mother, and it was saddening when Mrs Kottary contracted Rheumatoid Arthritis at a very young age and was later bedridden for many years until she finally passed away. Sailesh, her son was known to me from my Krishna Sadan days and when I started Argosy, I suggested to him that he could join me as a working partner and develop the Export business. Initially, Sailesh was reluctant but after much persuasion he agreed and both of us somewhere in early 1977 began our adventurous foray into the world of business together!

Keeping the Sabbath in India is a challenge- Colleges work on Saturdays and inevitably College and University exams fall on Saturdays! And also the Corporate world at least in the 70s had a six-day working week with only Sundays as the weekly off.

Therefore, in 1971, when I was baptized into the Seventh-day Adventist Church, I realized that there would be major challenges and difficulties ahead of me both at the University level as well as for my career, if I wanted to work in the Corporate world. Nevertheless, I forged ahead having complete faith in God working out the solutions for me and helping me to cross the bridges as they came along. Already God had successfully lifted me from my depression and healed me hence I knew that the same God would work miracles in my future life too!

My Father had a colleague at the Bank who in turn knew the Principal of Burhani College in Mazgaon and with his introduction, I was able to get admission for my Inter-Arts in the College and was also exempted from attending classes on Saturdays. But unfortunately, at the University level when the examination schedule was announced one of my subjects fell on a Saturday! It was a huge disappointment for me, but I was determined to keep the Sabbath holy hence I decided not to appear for that particular exam. I had to redo the examinations in October of that year and fortunately the exams did not fall on a Saturday and finally cleared my Inter-Arts but in the process I had already lost by now 3 years of my college career.

I was keen to move out of Burhani College and rejoin a College in South Bombay, but with my
Sabbath issue looming large, I was in a fix as to which College should I attend where I could get an exemption from attending classes on Saturdays! But with God all things are possible, and it soon came to pass that I happened to meet Ms Esther Kurien who was the Head of the English Department of Wilson College which had a history of over 100 years and had a stunning location facing the Arabian Sea at Chowpatty. Ms Kurien was very understanding and volunteered to give me Saturdays off at the College level but warned me that for the University examination, she would not be able to help in any way managing the examination schedule.

Then another miracle happened at the same time- we mentioned my Sabbath problem to Dr Sukumaran who was a Seventh-day Adventist himself and happened to be visiting Mumbai at that time. Dr Sukumaran who had received his PhD from the Bombay University knew many people in the University and one of them was Dr Iyer who was the Vice Principal of the Ruparel College. Dr Sukumaran gave me an introduction to him and therefore my father and I duly paid him a visit at his Matunga home. Weexplained to him our unique problem and to our utter surprise, he was very sympathetic and promised to help me. He explained that he luckily happened to be a Member of the Bombay University Senate and because of this position he was also in charge of the entire examination schedule of the Bombay University.

So as per his advice, I gave Dr Iyer the 8 Subjects for which I had to appear and he in turn ensured that none of these Subjects would be scheduled on a Saturday! This was the great Sabbath Miracle and in course of time, I finally finished my B.A. and became a Graduate in 1976!

The Seventh-day Adventist Church to which I now belong, had one unique feature which differentiated from other Christian churches and denominations – we kept the seventh day Sabbath and worshipped on Saturdays unlike other Christians who attended church on Sundays. What is the Sabbath, and why is it so important to Seventh-day Adventistm will form the core of my narration below.

The history of the Sabbath goes back to the very beginning of time when our Earth was created by God. The very first book of the Bible, called Genesis, tells the story of Creation: how God created everything, including our first parents Adam and Eve in six days; and rested on the seventh day, blessed the day and called it the Sabbath. The Sabbath is also called Shabbat by the Jews; and it forms the fourth commandment of the Ten Commandments which were given to Moses on Mount Sinai after the Israelites had left Egypt. But the Sabbath was practiced right from the time of Adam and Eve, and the seventh day was kept as the holy Sabbath, where no secular work was undertaken and all rested from their daily labour. The Sabbath day began on Friday evening at sunset and ended at sunset on Saturday. And this is what we Seventh-day Adventists continue to observe and practice to this very day.

I will now explain why the majority of the Christians go to church on Sundays to worship and how this change came about historically. Christianity spread across the then known World and it received royal patronage from Emperor Constantine. To appease his subjects, many of whom were Sun worshippers and many also Christians, he devised a brilliant political solution when he declared that Sunday would be holiday and also a day of worship. With this one proclamation he was able to please the Sun worshippers. To the Christians he explained that Christ had risen on a Sunday and hence it was not necessary to observe the Jewish Sabbath! This practice continues till today, and the majority of the Christians both Protestants and Catholics go to Church on Sundays and observe it as a holy day. The original Saturday Sabbath therefore has been lost in the mists, of time and today only the Jews and the Seventh-day Adventists observe it strictly.

So when I became a Seventh-day Adventist in 1971, I knew that it would be very daunting to keep the Sabbath holy – in India the Colleges have exams on Saturdays and it is not so easy to get a Saturday off from work! With all this in mind I totally had faith in God who I was sure would find a way out for me and that is exactly what happened as you will see from the narrative as we take this story forward!

My nervous breakdown and the slow recovery gave me time to introspect and look at life in a very different context. As I mentioned earlier, I started attending church again and spent a great deal of time in studying the Bible and fellowshipping with the Members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church which was just across the colony where we lived in Bombay.

The Seventh-day Adventist Family in India is very cosmopolitan and there were people from various parts of India as well as from various religious backgrounds; who had converted to Seventh-day Adventism which is the Protestant part of Christianity. I came to know of their conversion experiences and this greatly encouraged and motivated me – amongst them were people who came from various backgrounds including Marwaris, Hindu Punjabis as well as Sikhs, Muslims and Parsis! This diversity attracted me and slowly I became comfortable mingling with these Seventh-day Adventist Christians.

Conversion and Christianity had negative connotations for me earlier and I felt that there was a social stigma associated with such conversions. And of course, it is also true that conversions were at times not because of genuine convictions but had ulterior motives like marriage situations and getting jobs. All this had created stereotypes in Indian Society and therefore this was a major mental block for me to overcome.

Seventh-day Adventists observe the Saturday Sabbath and therefore church attendance is on Saturdays unlike other Christians including Catholics who go to church on Sundays. Seventh-day Adventists believe in observing the Saturday Sabbath strictly like the Jews and this was from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset when we abstain from any secular activity; including going to college and attending exams on Saturdays. I realized that this would pose a serious problem for me both educationally and from a career point of view, if I decided to embrace Seventh-day Adventism.

So there I was, at the crossroads of my life and I had to make the decision – to be a Christian or not to be a Christian! My inner voice told me that if I truly believed that God was in charge of my life, then I had nothing to fear, and to go ahead and make my decision. So in the latter half of 1971 when I was just turning 20 years old, I decided to officially become a Christian. This was my rebirth when I was baptized into the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Bombay!

Indeed, 1971 was a horrible year for me – I went through an acute anxiety phase including a fear of socializing, which finally culminated in a nervous breakdown! As mentioned earlier, I just about managed to give my First Year Arts exams, and luckily managed to pass. I decided to leave St Xavier’s College and instead opted for a distance learning course which I could do from home.

In my anxious state, I desperately started reading books on psychology including self-help books. I even read books on hypnotherapy, but somehow found little relief. My parents were very concerned with my health, and they tried their best to counsel and console me. My Mother spent a lot of time in prayer and Bible reading for my benefit.

Staying at home also gave me time to introspect – during my school days my interaction with the Seventh-day Adventist Church had reduced considerably. For 2 years from 1965 to 1967, our school had classes on Saturdays so it was impossible for me to attend church. From 1967, St Mary’s shifted to a regular 5-day week but my zeal to attend church had declined. However during this time, my Mother had developed close links with church members and her faith in Christianity and Jesus Christ had grown substantially.

I took a cue from my Mother and I prayed earnestly for healing. I also decided that I needed to realign my spiritual priorities; and reconnected with the Seventh-day Adventist Church nearby. In the meanwhile, we finally decided to seek psychiatric intervention. Though I initially reluctant, I finally agreed to visit a psychiatrist. We consulted a brilliant lady psychiatrist Dr Dhanalakshmi Iyer, at her consulting rooms in Harganga Mahal near Dadar circle. She reassured me that I had a very mild psychological disorder that could very easily be rectified. I underwent the medical treatment that had side effects like sleepiness, lethargy and a certain amount of memory loss.

I slowly regained my confidence and felt better and more comfortable in the company of people – with these baby steps I gradually felt comfortable going out and socializing. I joined Wilson College briefly in June of 1970, but because of the side effects of the medicines, was unable to concentrate, and decided instead to take on a distance learning course.

It was a cloudy June day when we got our Board Exam results, and I was happy to note that I had passed in the First Division. Clutching the result sheets, it was time to join a good college. I had decided to study the Arts and hence did not anticipate any difficulty in getting admitted into Bombay’s finest college, the St Xavier’s College.

So early on a rainy Monday June morning, Anjum and I got into a Bus and headed towards St Xavier’s College. We were thoroughly drenched by the time we reached but had taken sufficient precaution to carry our documents in a waterproof folder.

The College was teeming with eager students waiting to get admission and we found ourselves in a long queue. Our turn came towards mid-noon and after filling in the requisite forms, and a short interview with Fr John Misquitta, SJ, the Principal of the College, we were assured admission. We obtained his signature, paid our first term fees and also obtained our college ID card. By this time it was well past 3 pm, and we returned home happily, as Xavierites of the Class of 69!

The ambience in St. Xavier’s College is legendary – the famous canteen, glamorous crowd and lots of extra-curricular activities including the famous annual Malhar Festival. I was very shy, especially when it came to interacting with girls! This self-consciousness deterred me from any kind of public speaking. For instance, when Professor Godfrey, our English teacher selected my English essay for reading, I was asked to read the essay in front of the whole class… I still remember shaking like a leaf during the reading – sheer agony!

St Xavier’s had excellent faculty and I was fortunate to study under some really outstanding teachers. Ms Eunice D’Souza taught English Literature – she was very strict, and on one day reprimanded me for chewing gum during the lecture. We also had other great teachers like Professor Aguiar, Fr Emil D’Cruz (earlier College Principal, but also a humble lecturer in sociology). Another brilliant Professor was Fr Rudy Heredia who also taught us Civics and Sociology. Later in the college year, I was selected to represent St Xavier’s College in the United Nations Essay Competition on Human Rights. I participated but did not win anything.

I also had some very interesting classmates with whom I am still in touch – among them was Gautam Mukherjee. He had finished his schooling from the iconic British Public School of Berkhamsted (also the alma mater of the famous novelist, Graham Greene). I was fascinated with Gautam’s British accent and his absolute mastery over the English language! Another outstanding wordsmith was Ivan Kostka who, even at that young age was also the Bombay Correspondent of the famous Junior Statesman of Calcutta. Another classmate was Fredun De Vitre who regularly appeared on Doordarshan TV as a cricket commentator, in those early days of broadcast journalism.

My first year at St Xavier’s College was rapidly coming to an end. My social inhibitions, particularly the inability to interact with girls, soon began to take a toll of my mental health. I started avoiding going to college and became reclusive – I managed to just about drag myself to attend the final exams at the end of the college year. The future therefore looked frightening and bleak, and I will dwell more on this as we go ahead.

‘The Board Exams’ – these three words struck terror in our hearts, because they marked a watershed moment in our lives, and would determine our future careers. In the school year 1968-69, I entered the 11^th Standard – our last year in school before we took the boards and exited school life. So in early June of 1968, with the onset of the Bombay monsoon, I sat in the 11^th Standard, Division A classroom and readied myself to go to battle!

I really wanted to do well at these exams but, being weak in Maths, this would certainly affect my overall percentage, so I had to find a solution. I soon discovered that I could drop Maths safely as I was not planning to get into the Science stream in college and thus elected to do special Geography. But to do this, I had to get the permission of the School Principal. I enlisted the help of my Father and we both went and met Fr Aran, the School Principal. After much debate, Fr Aran finally relented and allowed me to opt for special Geography and miss out on Maths.

With this one problem safely tucked away, I decided to study regularly instead of waiting for a week before the exams as I was usually wont to do. But of course, though the spirit was willing, the flesh was extremely weak and I slowly lapsed into procrastination and time drifted by. I kept reading self-help books on how to stop procrastination but that was just to keep the guilt away! By the way, I have still not overcome procrastination even at the age of 68!

In no time, we entered the New Year 1969. In February, the school gave us study leave for the month of March as the board exams would start in early April. Before that, the Class of 69 would have its own farewell party before breaking up for the study leave. I was selected to give the farewell speech and to thank the school and its staff – I am reproducing below the speech that I wrote and delivered at this farewell:

The three weeks before the exams was sheer hell – the days were vanishing! Anjum, my childhood friend and I decided to study together at night, fortified this with gallons of hot coffee to keep us awake!

Finally the D-day arrived! Luckily Anjum and I, though in different schools, had the same examination centre in the crowded locality of Noor Baugh and Dongri. We left together. At the colony gate, we were cheered by the colony residents as a matter of tradition! We made sure we were on time at the examination centre and, once the first paper got over, we felt much better. The next four days flew by in a whirlwind, and before we realized it, the board exams were over. I still remember the wonderful feeling that I had, and the incredibly deep sleep that I enjoyed that night. I still recall that pleasurable moment even today!