2 Network NOTIFICATION

I, Pratik Modi, Alumni Co-ordinator, have been appointed vide letter No D.O.(O.ORD)42/12 dated 28 December 2012 by the Director IRMA, as the Returning Officer for conduct of elections to the 11th Executive Committee of the IRMA Alumni Association (IAA hereafter) in accordance with the provisions of its constitution:

And whereas under clause 9.0 read with clause 12.1 of the constitution, all ordinary members of the Association (as defined in clause 4.1 of the constitution) are required to elect the following Executive Committee members.1. One post of President

2. One post of Vice-President

3. One post of Secretary

4. One representative of each zone (as defined under clause 15.0 of the constitution which includes North, South, East, West, and International Zones)

And now, therefore, in exercise of my powers as the Returning Officer, call upon all ordinary members of the Association to elect the Executive Committee members as aforesaid as per the procedures laid down in Schedules 1&2 appended to this notification.

December 31, 2012 Sd/- Anand Returning Officer (Pratik Modi)

SCHEDULE 1

IRMA ALUMNI ASSOCIATION, ANANDSCHEDULE OF ELECTION, 2013

1. Date of issue of Election notification by the returning officer 31 December 2012

2. Last date and time for the receipt of nomination papers by the returning officer 4 February 2013

3. Scrutiny of nomination papers by the returning officer 6 February 2013

4 Last date and time of withdrawal of nominations to reach the returning officer 10 February 2013

5. Publication of voters’ list 15 February 2013

6. Post of ballot papers/voting guidelines to the electorate by the returning officer 20 February 2013

7. Last date and time for receipt of postal ballots/votes by returning officer 25 March 2013

8. Counting of votes and declaration of result by returning officer 29 March 2013

Members may send their ballot papers by ordinary post to save time. However, registered/couriered post will also be accepted. Hand delivery can also be made at the Alumni Office and acknowledgement obtained.

Withdrawal of nominations can also be made by fax, email, or by telegram followed by a confirmation by post.

The voters’ list would be published and exhibited prominently on a notice board at IRMA.

December 31, 2012 Sd/-Anand Returning Officer (Pratik Modi)

Contd. on page 47

Remembering the Legend3 Network CONTENTS

1. End of an Iconic Era .......................................................................................... 5 – Yoginder K Alagh2. Dr. V. Kurien: Persona and Contributions .......................................................... 6 – HS Shylendra 3. IRMA: The House that Kurien Built. ................................................................... 9 – Tushaar Shah 4. Remembering Dr. V. Kurien - the Father of White Revolution. .........................11 – Katar Singh5. Dr. Kurien’s Better Half. ................................................................................... 13 – Indrani Talukdar6. Up Close and Personal .................................................................................... 14 – PS Mohan 7. Amul Dairy Museum: The Milky Way to Success ............................................ 16 – Anand Venkatesh 8. Down Memory Lane......................................................................................... 17 – V Mukunda Das9. Decoding the King ........................................................................................... 18 – MS Sriram10. The Spirit of Cooperation ................................................................................. 20 – Haribandhu Panda 11. Carillon Chimes: A looming presence .............................................................. 23 – Indrani Talukdar 12. The Inimitable Dr. K. ....................................................................................... .24 – CP Mohan 13. Koffee with Kurien ............................................................................................ 27 – Meher Gadekar14. A Magnetic Personality .................................................................................... 30 – Anand Venkatesh15. Itna Vaada Kar de ............................................................................................ 31 – Paresh Bhatt16. Undeniably Unforgettable ................................................................................ 32 – Anshul Malik17. The Utterly Butterly Man .................................................................................. 34 – Priyam Mukherji18. Amul is a Woman Thing ................................................................................... 36 – Devaki Jain 19. I Too Had A Dream’: Book Review. .................................................................. 38 – Rishi Kesavaram

Network is a quarterly publication of IRMA aiming to generate communication among alumni, well-wishers and present

participants of IRMA. Send the materials for consideration of publicaion in Network to : [email protected]

Editorial Committee

Editor: Anand Venkatesh

Editorial Associate: Indrani Talukdar

Network Secretariat: Susamma T

Disclamer: The views and opinions expressed in articles are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of NETWORK, IRMA.

4 Network

Dear Esteemed Reader,

It is seldom that one has a sense of disbelief and doubt while reporting a factual event. But that is precisely the feeling one gets while writing that Dr Kurien is no longer with us, even after three months of his sad demise. It was universally felt at IRMA that the first and foremost thing IRMA can, and must do, to remember the legend is to bring out a special issue of Network dedicated to Dr Kurien. Indeed, this idea emanated from several quarters within IRMA at about the same time. The next question was, “what should this special issue contain?” Once again, the Network team felt that it should not just focus on the multitude of achievements by the great man, or for that matter, his yeoman service towards rural poverty alleviation. Rather, this issue should be about IRMA’s memories of Dr Kurien. This in turn leads to the question, who or what, is IRMA? To venture an answer: IRMA’s alumni and current participants, faculty past and present, staff members, and several well wishers of IRMA in the outside world. We felt that collating memories, views and anecdotes, from each of these would add another dimension to understanding Dr Kurien. In other words, ambitious though it may seem, one would get a chance to know Dr Kurien more as a human being transcending the vast sea of his legendary achievements. At the very outset, we realized that any effort in this direction would remain incomplete without hearing from Mrs Molly Kurien. The interview with Mrs Kurien was indeed an eye opener. It not only revealed fascinating insights about Dr Kurien the person but through Mrs Kurien’s humility and frankness we could fathom the crucial role she played in Dr Kurien’s feats which border on the unbelievable. Once again my hands tremble with disbelief when I recollect that within two months of the interview Mrs Kurien too left us to join her husband in his heavenly abode.

While compiling this special issue we realized that it is limiting to think that Dr Kurien touched the lives of only those who interacted with him in some capacity or the other. Current IRMA participants who had never seen Dr Kurien in person were desirous of writing about him based on the tremendous influence he had in their decision to shape their careers and lives in a particular way. Also the history and significance of two monuments in the proximity of which the immortal presence of Dr Kurien can be strongly felt – the Carillon Chimes and the Amul Museum – are covered in this issue.

As mentioned in the editorial of the previous issue of Network, we would be introducing changes which would make this lovely periodical even more reader friendly. For a start, we have brought out this special issue dedicated to Dr Kurien in colour. Also, articles are interspersed with photographs and blurbs. However, to know that we are in the right direction, your feedback is crucial for us. So please spare some time to email us your views, comments and suggestions to further improve Network.

Last, but by no means the least, do not confine articles on Dr Kurien to just special issues. Rather, let us make every issue of Network special by having articles in memory of Dr Kurien.

Yours Truly

Anand Venkatesh(Editor)

Editorial

Remembering the Legend5 Network End of an Iconic Era

With Dr. Kurien’s death an age has come to an end but his heritage lives on.

The passing away of Verghese Kurien marks the end of an

epoch. He was not only a man with a vision but one who could fashion it to create mighty edifices. He changed the discourse. When I went to the FAO for building its first global model of world agriculture an orthodoxy prevailed that dairying could only be carried out on a large scale, in ranches and large industrial complexes. The unemployed farmer was without resources and poor. Dr. Kurien said no: If the farmers can access technology and markets on their farms they would not be a problem but an asset. Having seen the dream he wouldn’t budge. He was right and he knew it in his heart. To him the critics were all wet and worse still, either “bureaucrats or charlatans”. First India and then the world recognised him with awards and glory.

He would cover the last mile. And how! In his biography there is the story of a crane going haywire. He jumps on it and bleeds but brings it under control. When I was in the Planning Commission in my early days he had a project on shrikhand for the Sugam dairy. Of course the Project Division guys wouldn’t bite. Halwais would become unemployed, they said. The technology of large scale was unproven. He asked me to help and I arranged a meeting. They went at him and he listened to them. Then looking them straight in the eye he said, “You fellows can’t milk a cow and will give me lectures”. If cheese had to be made he would reverse engineer it. If milk

had to be dispensed he would make the machine.

And of course, Amul became the symbol of all that was India. A cooperative must have regular elections. Its accounts must be audited annually. Kurien hated crooks and charlatans. When I was asked to succeed him at IRMA I said “No. He is my hero.” But I agreed to talk to him. It was at peak of summer in the Kurien enclave, one

as shining examples. This is the only management school that does not feel happy when you join an MNC.

What now, I am asked. Actually eras like this never come to an end. The National Dairy Development Plan talks about cooperatives, self help groups, and producer companies. Many NGOs have been working on these models. NABARD has been building financial products for them. Today, even corporations like

By: Prof. Yoginder K. Alagh, Ex-Chairman of IRMA, Email- [email protected]

Amul became the symbol of all that was India.

DCMs Harayali and Rallis’s I Shakti Pulses follow the Producer Company model. It is another matter that the Corporate Affairs Ministry has been giving a cold shoulder to the Second Amendment of The Company Act 2002 that mandated the Producer Companies. When I asked the author if the proposal for Producer Companies came from a group I chaired, he said nonchalantly, “Those are not companies”. Of course they are not. That’s what Kurien’s legacy is all about. Kurien’s heritage will not give up. It will give all of them a good fight.

of those deliciously languorous days in Gujarat, when he told me, “If you are doing it Yoginder, I am happy”.

A third of rural income comes from dairying and he produced the only model that is in existence. He created a phalanx that would follow through. He realised thirty years ago that it was not just machines and technology but managers who would make a difference. And of course, if they are needed they have to be the best. It is a pleasure to listen to the women and men he inspired. IRMans like Sodhi, Shiv Kumar and many others stand out

6 Network

With the passing away of Dr. V. Kurien a key phase in the

country’s history of the Amul-inspired cooperative movement has come to an end. While it is not clear how far an individual can influence the history of any movement, the distinct role of Dr. Kurien in the propagation of the dairy cooperative movement cannot be ignored. Before I go on to highlight some of his specific contributions I would like to briefly expound on certain personal characteristics underpinning his achievements.

Diminutive in height Dr. Kurien had a commanding presence, nonetheless. I realised this fact soon after having joined IRMA in 1993. During various talks and lectures and in my subsequent interactions with him I discovered in him a master orator who was instantly able to recall many historical facts and weave a wonderful story around them. His speeches would leave one spell bound. A colleague had remarked once that it was a blunder to make him read a written speech even during a formal occasion. Oration apart, he was a man of conviction and courage. Admittedly, Dr Kurien came to Anand as a reluctant professional. But once he decided to stay on there was no stopping him from his deep involvement with cooperatives and achieving whatever he wanted. What kept him stay put

Dr. V. Kurien: Persona and Contributions

Operation Flood and the setting up of IRMA were just two of Dr. Kurien’s several contributions, outstanding for their merit and vision.

in Anand was the conviction he developed while working with farmers and helping them build their own institutions. This became the single most important mission of his life and career, propelling him towards his innumerable accomplishments. From such strong conviction was born courage that, in turn, helped him surmount the challenges and adversaries he faced in life. No one could trifle with him or the institutions he created, and if he had to ruffle a few feathers in the pursuit of his goals he did so without turning a hair. The portrayal of Dr. Kurien would be incomplete without a mention of his commitment to simplicity, honesty and integrity, values that he pursued in both his personal and professional life. Dr. Kurien ensured that the projects and institutions he headed remained above board when it came to issues like corruption and nepotism.

I would now like to expound on some of his specific contributions, especially relating to Operation Flood (OF) and Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA), two of his major accomplishments.

Operation Flood (OF): OF was aimed at replicating and scaling-up the Anand Pattern Co-operative model (or Amul model) all over India. An exceptional project, it bore the stamp of Dr. Kurien’s acumen and execution.

Having been a manager himself while running a cooperative (Amul) effectively for nearly two decades, Dr. Kurien knew the ingredients of success needed for OF. Without going into all the details, which are widely known in any case, it is worthwhile recalling a few major strategies bearing the hallmark of the ‘Kurien style of management and development’. First and foremost, Dr. Kurien ensured that the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) set up for the purpose remained autonomous – legally and financially – even during the heydays of state and bureaucratic control endemic to all state-led bodies. Dr. Kurien was just not prepared for any kind of top-down bureaucratic system dictating the implementation of a development project. He not only succeeded in convincing the government that NDDB had to be set up away from Delhi, he also managed it highly professionally. Whatever success OF achieved was primarily attributable to this autonomy built very consciously. But Dr Kurien was also fully aware that the autonomy was to be used for the attainment of set goals and not squandered for any narrow gains. He used the autonomy to the hilt. He along with his team evolved many innovative strategies and practices while executing OF. Some

distinguishing features of the OF include its financing by converting

Remembering the Legend7 Network food aid into a development fund, professional management of programme implementation and the cooperatives that were created through multi-disciplinary teams, and the development of need-based technology. He insisted on making farmers’ cooperatives an integral part of OF. As far as Dr. Kurien was concerned, cooperatives were not merely instruments of project implementation but ways of unleashing the broader process of participation, democracy, and development. He went on to become the champion of the cooperative cause.

OF relied on small farmer based dairy development as opposed to the large scale mechanised dairy husbandry of western countries. This was a major developmental strategy that he consciously adopted given the conditions of rural India. Socially, it helped broad base the participation of a large number of small and marginal farmers in dairy development while economically it helped tap low cost resources of the farming community. But OF did face challenges and limitations that eluded solutions even for a master strategist like Dr. Kurien. The replication of the Anand Pattern Cooperatives encountered many difficulties at the state level. Non conducive conditions for the promotion and working of co-operatives in an autonomous way constrained the uniform success of OF. Being aware of this Dr. Kurien strongly advocated the promotion of autonomous cooperatives by reforming archaic cooperative legislations. Dairy cooperatives at the village level, like most other sectors, also got trapped in the mire of elitism. Dr. Kurien was well

aware of the class/caste tensions but could not explicitly strategise for such eventualities. He did believe, however, that economic development could surmount such contradictions in the long run. To him dairy development was, among other things, a strategy and means of attaining self-reliance for the developing countries. He strongly advocated protectionism against the machinations of developed countries.

OF was thus a unique programme that paved the way for combining institutions with professional management to uplift disadvantaged communities in developing countries. Dr Kurien wanted this approach to pervade other sectors of the rural economy. Academically speaking, somewhere along the way, this approach assumed the form of a new discipline called ‘rural management’

conceptual abilities of potential rural managers. IRMA has carved a unique niche for itself in the domain of rural management education bearing a deep imprint of its creator. Having realised the acute need for professionals to help manage farmers’ organisations Dr. Kurien was, in a way, compelled to establish IRMA with mainstream management institutions like the IIMs refusing to see his point of view. Having worked with farmers he was very clear on the type of education that needed to be imparted to potential rural managers. In one of his early speeches delivered before IRMA’s Board of Governors, Dr. Kurien had argued that, “…the orientation of these new managers will have to be substantially different. They must work under the compulsions of the farmers’ interest and therefore

IRMA – Dr. Kurien’s brainchild

that, in turn, led to the formation of the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA).

Institute of Rural Management Anand: IRMA is another major outcome of the visionary effort of Dr. Kurien. While NDDB was the field for pushing practical boundaries, IRMA became the base for honing

there must be a significant variation in their attitudes and character.” He had expressed the hope that “the IRMA Board would address itself to these questions right from the inception stage and that these concerns would be reflected in the selection procedures and curricula for the institute as well as all other

8 Network aspects of its functioning”. He had been clear in his mind regarding the expectations from rural managers and the kind of institution that needed to be created for them. His vision has helped IRMA evolve as a unique rural management institution.

As was the case with NDDB he realised that IRMA should have an autonomous governance structure. Autonomy was to be ensured in terms of governance and finances and in terms of intellectual reflection. During his tenure as Chairman he tried every possible way of ensuring

this. While ensuring autonomy from external forces he also advocated the faculty’s need for internal autonomy. A techno-manager to boot, Dr. Kurien sought the help of many renowned educationists and other experts of the country and abroad in shaping IRMA. He invited them to be on the Board of IRMA yet never allowed anyone to divert or hijack IRMA from its original mission. He was proud of the fact that while there were hundreds of management schools there was only one IRMA. Given the vast needs of the country

he was keen to replicate IRMA in different regions of the country which somehow did not materialise during his tenure.

To conclude, while history may judge him more comprehensively, Dr Kurien has left an indelible mark on of the institutions he helped create. The challenge before some of these institutions- NDDB or GCMMF or for that matter IRMA, is how to retain and sustain the basic purpose, excellence and integrity which Dr. Kurien tried infusing in them as a committed manager and visionary.

By: Prof. H.S. Shylendra, Professor, Institute of Rural Management, Anand, Email- [email protected]

Chairman’s Welcome Address to the 26th batch of PRM & the 4th batch of FPRM Students

June 17, 2005Dear PRM and FPRM students,

You all have joined IRMA this summer. I welcome you all to the Institute. You all will agree, I am sure, that you are very much privileged to get selected for admission here from amongst thousands who applied from all over the country. You will now have a golden opportunity to prepare yourself to work for a worthy cause i.e. for the betterment of rural India where the large mass of the deprived people live and who have been neglected for decades after Independence.

IRMA has state-of-the-art facilities to facilitate your studies. It has good faculty, excellent library, comfortable hostels with internet connection, and spacious sports amenities. The whole campus is maintained as an oasis of well manicured beautiful green lawns to keep you ever fresh and revitalised for conducting your studies sincerely in a serene environment.

All this is done with a purpose. IRMA is a unique institution. It is not similar to the mainstream common institutes of management education which are there in hundreds in the country – several of them running as teaching shops and some others mainly geared to meet the needs of the private corporates whose main objective is profit maximisation to further fatten the affluent classes, and the employees in such organisations commanding huge resources, may get fat salary and perks but essentially work as a cog in the gigantic corporate machine.

IRMA is not meant to follow the mainstream. It has a unique and noble mission, namely, to promote equitable and sustainable development, especially rural development with a view to benefit the large rural populace. How does IRMA endeavour to fulfil this mission and vision? It is through contributing to professionalise the management of the undermanaged rural organisations, especially people’s institutions like cooperatives and also, NGOs which honestly work in line with IRMA’s mission. IRMA conducts a set of programmes and activities for the purpose of professonalisation. PRM has been the main teaching programme here since the institute was set up 25 years ago. It has emerged as pioneering programme establishing the discipline of rural management which is being replicated elsewhere in the country. Launching of the FPRM has taken the discipline of rural management to a greater height.

We all have expectations in life. This is justified. But these days most people are largely after mammon worship. We need money which makes our life comfortable. Yes, money can buy you material comforts. But it cannot buy everything. One-sided pursuit of material comforts generally make us one-dimensional. Humans are not mere homo economicus (economic being). They are creative in nature and, hence, require space to innovate and create, which involves not only imagination but also confronting the existing challenges. Humans need respect and love in society.

Contd... p. 15

Remembering the Legend9 Network IRMA: The House that Kurien Built

Of all the magnificent institutions built by Dr. Kurien IRMA was, perhaps, closest to his heart.

During his long stint as a serial institution builder Dr. Kurien

emerged as a champion of farmer cooperatives. The National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) was a charitable trust and companies like HPCL, IDMC and Mother Dairy were owned by it. At one time the Tribhuvandas Foundation was a leading NGO of Gujarat, which Dr. Kurien helped set up along with several other institutions. There were few institutions, however, on which he showered as much care and attention as he did on IRMA.

The idea of IRMA was not on anybody’s mental map until 1978.Much before that, however, a realisation had dawned that Operation Flood II would not be able to take off without a cadre of trained managers. Dr Kurien offered to fund a separate course at IIMA to train cooperative managers but Ravi Mathai persuaded him against the idea. This led to the setting up of a large HR division within NDDB entrusted with the responsibility of producing cooperative managers. Ravi Mathai had, by then, introduced Dr Kurien to Kamla Chowdhury, and both he and the latter convinced Dr Kurien about building an autonomous institute with a distinct culture and values of its own. Sreekant Sambrani, who had done a stint at IIMA’s Center for Management in Agriculture, was hired to head the cell. While several names for the new institution were doing the rounds Sambrani helped freeze ‘Institute of Rural Management, Anand’ (IRMA). To dissociate it from the 1963 comedy Irma la Douce Sambrani wanted IRMA to be pronounced as ARMA and kept correcting anyone

who referred to it as EERMA, but gave up after sometime.

While returning from a trip to Europe Dr Kurien stopped by for a few hours to talk to the Swiss Development Cooperation (SDC) about IRMA and returned to Anand with a commitment from the Swiss to fund the construction of the entire campus, including the class room complex, auditorium hostels, faculty housing and everything else required to create an institution of character. The Swiss along with the Ford Foundation also offered to fund a faculty development program. Everything fell into place surprisingly quickly. IRMA looked like the right idea at the right time coming from the right man. The decision was taken to start a one-year program in rural

bovine diseases—was converted into a makeshift office and class room complex for a young IRMA.

Kanvinde and Rai, who happened to be among the best known architects of the country, were asked to design the IRMA campus on a 65 acre plot adjacent to the NDDB campus. There were opinions galore expressed on what the campus should look like. Someone suggested a rustic, austere place mimicking a village. Dr Kurien brushed it aside saying, “You cannot produce kings in a pigsty.” Building an educational institution was a wholly new experience for him. But he was soon forming his own vision of what was required. His vision of IRMA was of an institution that would produce young men and women who would think big, dream

management in 1980 using NDDB’s hostels meant for farmers to house students. The newly constructed diagnostic laboratory—which later did some path-breaking work on

big and, in time, act big and make their alma mater proud. He wanted IRMA to reflect the significance of India’s agricultural and rural economy to the country’s development. He

Dr Kurien seldom aired his views about what rural management meant to him

10 Network would only have the best. Later, after IRMA’s beautiful new campus was ready, he would proudly say: “I have built an invisible wall around IRMA. While they are here, I want IRMA students to be protected from the filth and the pettiness all around and dream big for the country and themselves.”

Dr. Kurien brought together a battery of some of the most experienced management thinkers and practitioners in the country to guide the institute through its formative years. These included Ravi Mathai, Kamla Chowdhury, A M Khusro, Hanumantha Rao, GVK Rao and several others who represented the best talent and wisdom available in different aspects of Indian economy. He welcomed all of them to shape the philosophy of the new Institute. But when it came to building the campus he appointed himself the Site Engineer-in-Chief. Once every week he would drive around the campus and ask detailed questions of the contractors and engineers. Attention to detail was the hallmark of his management style. He never tired of telling us, “The Lord lies in the detail”. Few campuses in India remain as pretty and well-groomed 30 years after construction as IRMA. This is undeniably one of Dr. Kurien’s lasting legacies.

As IRMA came into its own and as Dr. Kurien’s early advisors moved on, there developed an interesting relationship between the latter and IRMA’s faculty- which might be best described as one of creative tension, and managing this became a critical part of the Director’s responsibility. He abhorred the way he saw ‘academic freedom’ being turned into licence in Indian academia and wanted IRMA to be spared that. “Academic freedom is the freedom to think what you like and advance alternative theories, and not turn your back on your duty to your institution,

students and society,” is what he would say. He was also suspicious of faculty members travelling abroad, especially to the West: “Why don’t we go to Bangladesh or Africa or China to learn and do research? Are the US and Europe sole repositories of knowledge about development?” It was not easy to answer these questions. He was also wary of IRMA being overwhelmed by IIMA’s influence and wanted IRMA to chart its own course. He would often say, “Your best rural managers will be odd-balls but your selection of students based on the objective written test will keep most such odd-balls out of IRMA.”

It would be wrong to say that Dr Kurien’s own management style was closer to Theory Y than to theory X. But he was an extraordinary example of an authoritarian manager who seldom actually used authority. He inspired people like nobody else did. During the 1950’s and 60’s in Amul he acquired and retained a world-class management team that few multinational companies could boast of. His managerial authority blended with his personal power and charm potently to keep his colleagues and co-workers in a permanently charged state. The fact that he pursued a larger-than-life goal over personal gain added to his magic. He took pride in living in an air-conditioned house and moving around in an air-conditioned car paid by farmers. He insisted that farmers were not bad paymasters if their managers helped them improve their lives.

Dr Kurien seldom aired his views about what rural management meant to him. The debate seemed meaningless to him and he thought IRMA was wasting time splitting hair on it. I strongly feel that IRMA’s aim should be understand the operating system of India’s rural economy; his own spin was that this understanding should be used to further farmer’s

interests. While making a difference between rural management and public administration he was clear that IRMA was not best suited to train administrators in the conventional sense of the term. Organising rural producers in viable organisations for dairy, oilseeds, fruit and vegetables, salt, fishing, canal irrigation, health and a range of other economic activities was, in his view, a large and important playing field for IRMA. He also saw the rural manager as a man of action more than of analysis. Honing decision-making skills was at the heart of rural management in his scheme of things. But he also believed that in order to make sound decisions a rural manager must have a good understanding of his milieu.

Dr Kurien’s ideas of management were based on a distinct model of man. He abhorred treating farmers and rural people as poor and helpless. He never approved of treating them with pity, even sympathy; instead, his constant refrain was that the farmer should be respected for his innate wisdom. He believed in opening the door of opportunity for the farmer. “The human machine is a wonderful machine’, he used to say, ‘the more you load it, the harder it works.”

Dr Kurien always saw IRMA as belonging to a class of its own, not to be compared with other business schools. And yet he expressed child-like joy and pride when a survey of management institutes in India ranked IRMA amongst the top 10. He thought it was a sign of IRMA coming into its own. Had he been alive today he would have been overjoyed to see IRMA’s ranking jump from 41 to 22 in a recent Business India survey. The real tribute IRMA can pay to its founder is to get counted amongst the top five management institutes of the country, a feat that is wholly within the realm of possibility.

By: Prof. Tushaar Shah, Former Director of IRMA, currently Senior Fellow: IWMI, E-mail- [email protected]

Remembering the Legend11 Network Remembering Dr. V. Kurien - the Father of White Revolution

A nostalgia-filled Tribute by one of IRMA’s Former Directors

The late Dr. Verghese Kurien, popularly known as the Milk Man

of India, was born on November 26, 1921 at Kozhikode, Kerala. His father was a civil surgeon in Cochin and his mother was a highly educated Syrian Christian lady. Dr. Kurien passed away at the age of 90 in the early hours of September 9, 2012 at a Nadiad hospital near Anand after a brief illness. He is survived by his wife, a daughter, and a grandson. Although a native of Kerala by birth he chose Anand in Gujarat as his karma bhumi, where he stayed and worked for over six decades.

Dr. Kurien was the architect of India’s modern dairy industry and has been rightly called the Father of ‘White Revolution’. He ingeniously designed, funded and implemented the Operation Flood (OF) programme, which was the world’s largest dairy development programme. OF enabled India not only to attain self sufficiency in milk production but also to emerge as the world’s largest milk producer. The Amul model of dairy development underpinning the OF is, today, an internationally renowned strategy for promoting the economic and social well being of small milk producers including millions of landless households, marginal and small farmers. Amul brand dairy products are known their quality.

The array of top-notch institutions that Dr. Kurien built, nurtured, and

managed includes the names like AMUL, Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), National Dairy Development Board, and IRMA. He was Founder Chairman of IRMA until he relinquished his office in 2006. Of all the institutions that he founded, IRMA was closest to his heart. He founded IRMA with the conviction that the rural managers produced by IRMA would help transform India’s rural sector into a vibrant, modern, and progressive entity via professional management. I remember him saying that ‘rural’ did not mean ‘backward’, nor did he want rural managers produced by IRMA to live in thatched huts and serve the rural poor while remaining poor themselves. He wanted IRMA graduates to be reasonably well paid à la their counterparts from the IIMs and other reputed management schools and to serve the rural sector with a missionary zeal. He would often exhort the IRMA students saying that if one Kurien could make such a difference to India’s dairy sector, there was no reason why thousands of IRMA graduates could not transform the entire rural sector, alleviate the problems associated with rural poverty, and enable rural producers to attain the economic and social status they deserved.

He visualised IRMA graduates heading all governmental and non-governmental organisations engaged in rural development eventually.

He dreamt of an All India Rural Management Service along the lines of the Indian Administrative Service. Part of his aspiration has been fulfilled with several IRMA graduates

now heading many prestigious organisations including AMUL, GCMMF, and the agri-business division of ITC.

Dr. Kurien’s contribution to rural development, particularly to cooperative dairy development, has been recognised at both the national and international levels. He garnered many prestigious awards including the Ramon Magsaysay Award-1963, Wateler Peace Prize -1986, Krishi Ratna Puruskar -1986, the World Food Prize-1989, Padma Vibhushan -1999 and the Economic Times Life Time Achievement Award – 2001. Besides, he was also awarded honorary doctorate degrees by 11 reputed Indian and foreign universities including his alma mater, Michigan State University, USA.

I had the pleasure and privilege of working closely with Dr. Kurien for over 22 years till August 31, 2002 when I retired as Director, IRMA. Dr. Kurien was an engineer by training but a manager par excellence by practice. He believed

Dr. Kurien built, nurtured and managed dozens of institutions of excellence

12 Network that management was better taught by those who have managed organisations than by those with MBA degrees sans management experience. While meeting with IRMA’s faculty he would shoot the question, and I quote him, “how many of you have managed any organisation?” Meeting with a negative response he would ask, “How can you teach management?” He was vocal in his criticism of social scientists, particularly economists whom he would often deride. He was fond of saying that social scientists did not engage in any constructive development work but only wrote and criticised those who did good work for people’s benefit.

A great strategist he knew how to use politicians and bureaucrats to help achieve his mission. I can recall a plethora of instances when he achieved his objectives using this approach. I shall cite just one of them here. The proposal for setting up IRMA had been pending with the Ministry of Agriculture for over two years. The Expenditure Finance Committee (EFC) would raise trivial queries which it would expect IRMA to answer. Since I was, at the time, IRMA’s Coordinator, Administration, Dr. Kurien would ask me to answer the queries and put up drafts of letters to the EFC on his behalf. That done, more queries would follow suit. As the cycle went on he got fed up and came up with an ingenious solution. He invited the then prime Minister of India, Mrs. Indira Gandhi as Chief Guest at IRMA’s first Convocation. Having known Dr. Kurien personally Mrs. Gandhi accepted the invitation. Word got around and the Ministry of Agriculture got into action, speeding up the process of granting its

approval to the proposal. Very soon thereafter, IRMA got a telegram from the Ministry stating that the IRMA proposal had been approved by them. Dr. Kurien’s happiness knew no bounds.

Dr. Kurien was my mentor from whom I learnt many invaluable guru mantras of management from time to time. Some of those mantras are recapitulated below:

• Attach the highest values to integrity and sincerity in your work and behaviour.

• Give people more than what they expect.

• Give adequate attention to even the minute details of every job assigned to you

• While writing a letter to an important person prepare several drafts, revise and improve them until you are fully satisfied.

• Before making a call to an important person or official seeking his / her approval of an important proposal, rehearse it several times before you make the call.

• Be punctual and ensure punctuality from everyone else in the organisation / department that you head.

• Keep your eyes and ears open for knowing what is happening in your organisation.

• Remain accessible to even the lowest level employees in your organisation and act on their suggestions, if required, to both reform the system and/ or redress their grievances.

• Be courteous and follow etiquettes when meeting visitors

and attending official functions and meetings.

Dr. Kurien was both feared and respected by officers and staff in the organisations that he founded and headed. His critics considered him ruthless and a dictator. Yet I was never afraid of him and had always an easy access to him. What is more, I found him to be a great human being with a kind heart full of compassion and strong convictions.

Dr. Kurien was a great patriot, a visionary, and a real Bharat Ratna in the literal sense. Farmers, particularly milk producers, will always remember him as their messiah. He had unflinching faith in producers’ cooperatives as the best instrument of promoting the economic and social well being of rural producers and pursued this philosophy single-mindedly throughout his life. I don’t know of any living person who has contributed so much towards promoting the cause of agricultural and rural development in India. May his high ideals and lofty principles guide and inspire the young generation of rural managers to contribute their best in the service of rural producers in India.

By: Dr. Katar Singh, Former Director of IRMA; currently Honorary (Founder) Chairman, India Natural Resources Economics and Management (INREM) Foundation, Anand -388 001 E-mail: [email protected]

“The establishment of IRMA in 1979, with the objective of providing high quality management training, research and consultancy support to cooperatives and rural development organisations was yet another creative and innovative venture for which the nation would always remain indebted to Dr. Kurien and his colleagues”.

– Dr Manmohan Singh, Secretary, GOI 10th Annual Convocation Address, 1991

Remembering the Legend13 Network Dr. Kurien’s Better Half

An informal tête-à-tête with Mrs. Kurien.

The staid grace of Molly Kurien appears to epitomise the oft-

repeated cliché: “Behind every successful man is a great woman.” Mrs. Kurien’s greatness lies in her quiet strength and fortitude. Her recent loss hasn’t daunted this indomitable woman who stood by her legendary husband through the vicissitudes of a life full of brilliance and inspiration. The drawing room of her house reflects the reticent grandeur of its occupant. Her daughter Nirmala, she says, lives in Chennai. She looks at us as if bracing for the inevitable question: what part did she play in her husband’s revolutionary contributions?

“It was all his doing, all the ideas, everything,” she smiles, “I, of course, supported him.” Did the Kuriens have a social life? “Here? In this town? Do you know, when I first came to Anand I wanted to run away!” she articulates in a tone that doesn’t betray a trace of her Keralite origin. Communication was a barrier being unfamiliar with the language. “I still can’t speak Gujarati,” she sighs. “It was a little difficult to have a social life really given the hectic schedule of my husband,” she admits. “By the time he would return from work it would be seven thirty (if he didn’t have a meeting, that is). Dinner would soon follow and he would be in bed by nine.”

In the early years, when Dr. Kurien was building Amul and other institutions, he would wake up at two thirty in the morning, deliberate on what was to be done and then go back to sleep to wake up later at six am. This was the routine for several years.

Waking up at the wee hours of the night had become endemic to the existence of the couple. “Every now and then he would have to run to Delhi with regard to work. The nearest airport being in Ahmedabad we would have to rise at two thirty so that he would be able to catch the early morning flight to Delhi.” And so it went on for years. “One of the good things about Kurien was that no matter how challenging the work at hand, he was able to switch off at will. He never carried his work worries into the house.” The secret of longevity in a long-standing relationship like marriage, perhaps?

Did the originator of India’s White Revolution exhibit any of his by-now famous traits of integrity and punctuality at home? “He certainly did so,” she laughs. “If he set a time he would stick to it no matter what. And he stood by the principle of integrity right till the very end.” Yet the man, contrary to his image, was far from formidable. Once a young student wanted to meet with him and simply hung outside, too overawed to enter. Dr. Kurien, on learning of this, invited her in. Later the student couldn’t help lauding aloud the humility and friendliness of the man.

With her husband constantly under the spotlight his better half devoted herself fully to the running of the house, which she did with full capability at her command. During his frequent absences she turned towards her favourite passion: books. “I love mystery thrillers,” she enthuses, her favourite author being John Grisham among other mystery novelists. “And I love dogs!” she beams recalling with affection

the twin rust-coloured setters she had raised since they were pups. Dr. Kurien, not overly fond of pets, too grew to love them. Dr. Kurien did not share her passion for reading although he loved reading newspapers and watching TV news. An ardent sports’ lover he enjoyed a good of tennis. Chess was his favourite among indoor sports. “Only towards the end,” she reminisces sadly, “he started withdrawing. He didn’t want to play any game, not even chess.”

Time is merciless, as they say, and on September 9 it took away her husband and a great soul from our midst. It is a loss Mrs. Molly Kurien has borne with characteristic fortitude and grace. That day, at the Kurien’s tastefully appointed house we learnt a little more of the man that was Dr. Kurien. And we came away with deep admiration for his better half.

Indrani Talukdar, Editor, IRMA, E-mail: [email protected]

Mrs. Molly Kurien

Mrs. Kurien was interviewed by the Network team in October 2012, prior to her sad demise

14 Network Up Close and Personal

Being personal assistant to a legend is never easy, yet it is also an experience to be valued.

This happened one winter. November 1998, to be precise.

Dr. Verghese Kurien, who had just stepped down from the Chairmanship of NDDB shifted his office to IRMA. I was told by the Administration Coordinator that I would henceforth be working in Dr. Kurien’s Secretariat. I received the news with mixed feelings having heard umpteen stories about my legendary new boss who had the reputation for being a hard task master. I had long known about his strict views on discipline and punctuality and was already trembling thinking of my new assignment.

On the first day I entered the office I was greeted by P.A. Joseph, Dr. Kurien’s Executive Assistant who laid my considerable fears aside. Joseph would be taking work instructions

from our boss while I would take care of all routine matters of office correspondence and coordinate his travel plans. Joseph, obviously, had more interactions with him than I did. Then Joseph went on leave and I was required to interact with him on a one on one basis. I would enter Dr. Kurien’s office with trepidation telling myself, “a mouse entering the lion’s den” and hear my heart thudding. In time I realised the deep humility of the man. It dawned on me that me that Dr. Kurien’s personality was coconut-like: hard on the outside and soft inside. All that he asked for was that the job on hand be attended to with immediate effect. He also liked to have honest answers sans trappings. If you did not know something required of you, it was best to admit it instead of humming and hawing.

Dr. Kurien’s punctuality fixation is well known. He would make a point of being present – meetings included – prior to the time fixed. Those were the days when, during guest programmes arranged by the NDDB, guests would also come thronging to IRMA, AMUL, and other places. Any delay in a guest programme or a meeting would have the programme coordinator come running to Dr. Kurien informing him about it.

Once, during the height of summer, someone from a group of visitors questioned Dr. Kurien about the green lushness of the lawns at the Institute. Dr. Kurien, then IRMA Chairman, looked at the group and solemnly declared, “we don’t water the lawns.’ As he paused for a second before throwing up both hands in his characteristic style everybody looked

The Government of India showered him with awards; the highest Indian award, “Bharat Ratna”, kept eluding him.

Remembering the Legend15 Network

By: P S Mohan, EA to Chairman, IRMA; Email- [email protected]

on expectantly. “We pour milk, our heart!” The group burst out laughing.

Like his punctuality, his meticulousness had become a byword in IRMA. I recall an incident from when I was working at the Director’s office. Draft agenda items prior to Board meetings would be sent to Dr. Kurien who was then Chairman. A board member from the Rural Development Ministry of the Central Government had just been transferred to another government department. He had, as a consequence, ceased to be a member of the IRMA Board. I had forgotten to remove his name

from the members’ list on the draft agenda before sending it off to the Chairman who immediately crossed out his name. When I mentioned this to Prof. Tushaar Shah, who was then Director of the Institute, he laughed and said, “That is why Dr. Kurien is our Chairman!” The smallest of mistakes did not escape his sharp eyes. There would be no pending correspondence in Dr. Kurien’s office. All decisions would be taken immediately and all incoming letters answered with immediate effect.

The Government of India showered him with awards including the

Padma Shree, Padma Bhushan and Padma Vibhushan. The highest Indian award, “Bharat Ratna”, kept eluding him, however.

It is said that behind every successful man there is a woman. Inestimable credit goes to Mrs. Molly Kurien who stood behind her husband like a solid rock. Dr. Kurien used to say: “Integrity, Integrity and Integrity.” That’s the stuff legends are made of. We are all fortunate for having had Dr. Kurien as our Founder Chairman whose vision, mission and guidance made what IRMA is today.

IRMA endeavours to prepare you to actualise all your human potentialities - to grow yourself but also contribute to the development of others, particularly the rural sector which has remained largely neglected and without whose development India cannot develop much. Rural India remains mired with several serious problems like poverty, illiteracy, unemployment, inequalities, discriminations and environmental degradations – all these being gigantic in magnitude. Moreover, these problems are getting further aggravated in recent years due to the negative impact of the forces of globalisation, particularly on the weaker sections of society who live in large number in rural areas, though the upper and urban middle classes have benefited from the recent changes. The challenges before the country today are manifold and very critical. IRMA is focused to contribute to resolve the challenges confronting rural India. But resolving these challenges would require not only expertise and knowledge, but more importantly conviction, commitment and sincerity.

Having graduated from here and while working for the rural sector, where I wish to see you, I am sure, you will have enough to meet your material needs. Moreover, rural India would provide you ample space to be innovative and creative in your activities. You will be able to fully utilise your head - expertise and skills learnt here and elsewhere - and also heart to promote the cause of the weak and the marginalized. Very difficult challenges may come your way while doing your work in and for the rural sector. But when both head and heart are together, you will be able to withstand all adversities and emerge victorious. That has been my experience working for over 50 years for the rural sector. The rewards of even your every small success would be immense - not mere material but also social and psychological. You will certainly be able, like many IRMANs who are working in and for the rural sector despite all adversities, to bring a smile on the face of the common people, particularly the weak and the marginalised. In lieu of that, the love and respect the people would shower over you, will bring the kind of happiness in your life which even a huge pile of money can never ever buy.

I hope, you all will take the institute to further heights through your studies and subsequent contributions to rural India. Your happiness will always make me ever happier in life. I am now old, but only in age. My commitment to the cause of rural India remains unshaken. In fact, in view of the hunger for power and money increasing all around these days, my resolve has got further affirmed. Like you, like other IRMANs, you are the ambassadors to carry forward the mission of the Institute. I am confident you will never falter in marching ahead and bring a smile to the lowliest in the land.

I take this opportunity once again to welcome you all to IRMA.

I wish you all the best.

Contd... from p. 8

16 Network Amul Dairy Museum:

The Milky Way to SuccessA groundbreaking museum in the heart of the city showcasing

Dr. Kurien’s magnificent successes in the dairy industry is definitely worth a visit.

The Amul Dairy Cooperative Museum is a major landmark of

Anand city. If one desires to obtain a sound understanding of the evolution of the dairy cooperative industry in Gujarat spearheaded by Dr Kurien, which has uplifted multitudes of farmers, this is the place to visit. It is located on the Amul Dairy premises. Visitors are greeted by a lovely fountain and a building made of red stones. The pathway to the gallery is adorned with a number of photographs depicting the gradual evolution of the dairy cooperative industry in Gujarat. Indeed, each photograph contains a unique story within it. Also there are photos showcasing some historic letters, a key one being that sent by Sardar Patel to Amul Dairy bemoaning the monopoly of Polson Dairy and the need to address this issue at the earliest. The Public Relations officer, Mr. Sundar, further livens it up with lots of interesting historical anecdotes. In fact, he has done immensely well by translating Sardar Patel’s letter in English. The Dairy Museum also has an Auditorium equipped with 100 seats, where movies on the history and evolution of the milk movement of India are projected. Mr. Sundar recounted Dr. Kurien’s innumerable memorable interactions with young students here.

The piece de resistance is the garage where Dr Kurien spent his early days in Anand as a reluctant apprentice. This garage, which was located near Anand railway station, was literally rebuilt, brick by brick, on the Amul Dairy premises. It is indeed fascinating, yet frightening, to think that the legend spent his initial days in such circumstances. It is perhaps symbolic of the rapid strides made by dairy cooperatives in Gujarat under the able leadership of Dr. Kurien, Tribhovandas Patel, and other stalwarts. Adjacent to the garage is the house where Dr. Kurien subsequently lived, a grand structure in white. The entire ground floor of

By: Prof. Anand Venkatesh, Associate Professor, IRMA, Email- [email protected]

the house has an inspiring display

of the many, many awards won by

Dr. Kurien for his yeoman service

to the cause of rural livelihoods and

poverty alleviation in Gujarat. The

Ramon Magsaysay and Padmashri

awards deserve special mention.

Dr Kurien’s penchant for perfection

can be gauged from the lush green,

prim and proper lawns surrounding

his house.

One leaves the museum in quite a

bit of awe, as also with a healthy

dose of inspiration regarding the

infinite potential of the human mind,

body and soul.

The piece de resistance is the garage where Dr Kurien spent his early days in Anand as a reluctant apprentice.


By: Dr. V. Mukunda Das, former faculty of IRMA; currently the Director of Chandragupt Institute of Management Patna, an institution built on the lines of IIMs by the Government of Bihar. E-mail: [email protected]

Down Memory LaneA formidable figure who was as cutting in his speech as he was witty,

Dr. Kurien was also the milk of human kindness and the epitome of fairness.

This happened in October 1979. One afternoon Dr. Kurien called

all the people who had joined IRMA but working out of NDDB (there being no IRMA campus). These included Tushaar Shah, VC Sood, Arvind Swaminathan, Prof. S Sambrani, and Soman Nair. Soman Nair, who had just got the Institute registered was to hand over the certificate to VC Sood. In my youthful innocence I asked a question “Sir, how do you feel, seeing IRMA getting registered?” Dr. Kurien shot back “I am not going to study at IRMA, nor will I teach at IRMA. Therefore, you guys have to take it to better heights every year.” He further said, “Please remember that there is an imaginary wall of excellence I am building around this institution. Keep it up even after my death.” There was subdued laughter.

Another incident comes to mind. This was in the early 80’s, when we had a minor conflict regarding who would hoist the flag on Independence Day and Republic Day at IRMA. A proposal went to Dr. Kurien’s office requesting him to hoist the flag on both days as he was the Chairman of IRMA. Dr. Kurien redounded with: “What is the name of that fellow who is the senior most employee of IRMA?” When my name was mentioned he said: “Let that fellow hoist the flag on Independence Day and Republic Day.” I had the privilege of hoisting the flag at IRMA on both these important days till I left in 1991.

Another IncidentMy paper on “India’s Rural Consumers” was accepted for

presentation at the Academic of Marketing Science Conference, USA in 1987. I contacted the then Director PS Appu for travel support but was rejected. An old friend (Venu) in Ahmedabad, who was running a travel agency, happened to mention that he could get me a ticket from

at the conference do you think I would have had the courage to come and meet you?” I told him the truth about how I had got the tickets and paid for them. That’s when he changed his tone and tenor and said gently, “You know, these days, so many foreign agencies hook good

“There is an imaginary wall of excellence I am building around this institution. Keep it up even after my death.”

India to the

Conference venue and back at 50 percent the market rate (around Rs.7000 at the time). I borrowed money from several sources and decided to go (my first sojourn outside India) to present my paper. I informed the Director’s office about going to the US for a paper presentation one day prior to my departure. On my return there was a one-page letter from Dr. Kurien (who was officiating as Director at the time) asking why action should not be taken against me for going abroad. This letter was lying on my table. Some of my colleagues couldn’t help making sarcastic comments or indulging in sadistic laughter on seeing my woeful condition. (The letter also mentioned that I should reply within 24 hours of receiving it). I did not reply to the letter instantly instead, I sought an appointment with Dr. Kurien. Walking into his room the following day I realised he did not know that I had applied for travel support from the Institute and been rejected. I told him, “Sir, had I taken money from some foreign sources and participated

academicians through funding and, if anybody from IRMA gets into such a trap, bad name will ultimately come to the Institute. That is why I wanted an explanation.” He concluded with: “In any case, do give a reply to my memo immediately.” I sent the reply within one hour. Some of my well-meaning colleagues looked happy and the others sad.

That was Dr. Kurien- a Lion who could roar and be as gentle as a lamb at the same time.

“It would call for deep commitment

and a willingness to stake all, if one

is to succeed. The struggle would be daunting, but when the day is won, I am sure you would find that

it was well worth it. You are setting

out from under the guardianship of one of the finest victors of such a struggle, and I am sure you will find

Dr. Kurien’s example a great source

of inspiration when the going is tough.”

– Shri Pranab Mukherjee (Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission)

11th Annual Convocation Address, 1992

18 Network Decoding the King

A rather sassy observation of the Colossus that was Dr. Kurien, with tongue firmly in cheek!

It was a Sunday morning. As the flight doors were closing with the plane

about to head out of Ahmedabad I got an SMS stating that Dr.Kurien was no more. This was wholly unanticipated as I had been in IRMA the previous day attending a board meeting.An accidental meeting with Sodhi of GCMMF had given rise to an exchange of pleasantries, nothing more. So the nation was bidding goodbye to the grand old milkman who had a fulfilling 90th birthday just about recently. The country said goodbye, even before they could confer on him with a Bharat Ratna something that could have made the nation proud. But then, we can take solace in small mercies in this slip in the fact that even Gandhi missed the Nobel peace prize.

I learnt that Kurien was not buried customary to religion but cremated at the Anand electric crematorium as per his wishes. That was KingKurien for us, having his way in life and in death. The reason for the cremation was cited as his wish to be sent to the other world in a modalitycompatible with the local culture and which also respected the farmers that he had served all his life. I was somewhat astounded, to tell the truth, as he had never adapted himself to the local culture: living life on his terms, claiming that he never liked milk and never drank it, wearing non-vegetarianism on his sleeve and refusing to speak Gujarati. Far stronger was the possibility that he did not want a memorial built at an inappropriate place amidst a crowd of tombstoneshaving already ensured

how posterity should remember him- evidence being available in the immortalisation of the garage he lived in along with the museum atAmul.

For somebody like me whose career has been shaped by the early gleanings at IRMA, Kurien was certainly an inspiration. However, it was always a challenge to see how this inspiration could be internalised. Each leader comes as a package replete with positives and negatives. I have to say, though, that unless one has the complete qualities of a personality like Kurien it is impossible to pull off his style. During our student days at fieldwork and during our internships I found many a manager at NDDB and associated institutions behave with the arrogance that mimicked the grand old man without the backing of talent and ability. We saw many of these celebrated managers fall by the wayside as they tried to emulate his style sans substance.

Kurien embodied fearlessness, tenacity of purpose, perseverance, integrity, and ethics.Did he embody fairness? I am not sure. Deep down he was very practical.Having seen so much corruption and inefficiency he was possibly suspicious, which made him a control freak. Having served at two institutions – one that had a quintessential Kurien mark all over it (IRMA)and the other that had the personality of his cousin Ravi Matthai stamped all over (IIMA) – one could spot the fundamental difference in the approach of these two institutional builders.

Matthai had a sense of equity and trust imprinted on his management style. That put a greater responsibility on individuals to deliver because it was a loss of honour not to do so. The Kurien style was suspicion and hierarchy. The loyalty for the purpose that we were to serve had to be worn on the sleeve and reiterated often.

The trigger for setting up IRMA came from the realisationthat talents from institutions like IIMA wereserving corporate bodies without a “soul”; IRMA was supposed to be an institution with a difference. Kurien, we are told, sought the inputs of Matthai on how to get the place going. Matthai was also on the board of IRMA as long as he was alive. However the first significant difference we saw in IRMA was the way hierarchy was embedded in the organisation, with several operational matters being escalated all the way up to the Chairman. The IIMA Chairman was at best seen five to six times on the campus, largely when there was a board meeting.

IRMA was an institution that had passion, a holier than thou body language; it gave moral authority but was an institution of permissions and paper. The hierarchy was unambiguous in the allotment of quarters, travel eligibility, and the sense of autonomy. The conceptof right and wrong was not always left to the conscience of the individual but had to be checked with a higher up, that could go all the way up to the Chair.

Remembering the Legend19 Network So, in celebrating the greatness of the hero, his flamboyance, and his success what are the personality traits we should look for from him?

a) Integrity: The basic element to carry any agenda forward. A compromise was a compromise and that was the first sign of rot. Be it in the admission process, or in spotting merit, or not succumbing to pressure at the cost of losing; integrity is what was going to hold us in good stead;

b) Fearlessness: Integrity is an essential condition for fearlessness but not sufficient. Recognising that if we do not speak up, no one else would on our behalf. Fearlessness could not be delegated. And speaking up is an essential feature of pushing any good agenda forward.

c) Perseverance: It is easy to have both integrity and fearlessness and still quit. Yet unless we put both these attributeson the job with consistency nothing can be achieved.

d) Being unreasonable: Kurien was the one – and possibly the only one – who taught us that being unreasonable was “cool”. Whether it was the audacity of telling Prime Minister Shastri that the headquarters of the Dairy Board should be in Anand, that he would take a salary only from farmers and pulling off a possible conflict of interest between his position of Chairman of NDDB and Chairman of GCMMF, he could do it with style.

Today, as we find ourselves in the thick of a raging debate on FDI and conspiracies of foreign hands

By : M S Sriram (PRM 3), Former faculty of IRMA, Board Member of IRMA, Email- [email protected]

“using” our land for grand purposes I chuckle at how Kurien turned the tables around a possible international conspiracy. The conspiracy theorists would have insisted that by dumping Butter Oil and Milk Powder on to the hapless citizens of a backward country the Europeans were killing our market, competitiveness, and abilities. Kurien used these very tools to launch Operation Flood to make India self-sufficient in milk and even export dairy products proving thereby that it is not always necessary to go through the victim syndrome of being “used”. One can pretend to be vulnerable to be used while using the user! So was commodity aid a EU conspiracy to weaken Indian markets? Or was it an Indian conspiracy to cock a snook at EU? ChachaKurien(well, the next gen called him Daddu) would be having a chuckle up there with his mischievous and twinkling eyes.

Unless one has the complete qualities of a personality like Kurien it is impossible to pull off his style.

20 Network

Dr. Verghese Kurien is no more. In the early

morning of 8th September, 2012, he died at the age of 91 at Anand, Gujarat, his adopted home of more than six decades, far away from his place of birth in Kerala, after a long and eventful journey towards a ‘dream’ that remained unfinished. A proud Indian, he pursued the dream that our founding fathers and mothers saw at the dawn of the country’s independence: to build a just society. His cooperative dairy movement was aimed at making India the largest milk producer in the world. He was driven, through the institutions he created, to build sustainable competitive advantage of the dairy industry. Without him it would have been impossible to argue that technology-led, market oriented, illiterate and poor farmer-owned large scale businesses regarding perishable commodities was practically possible. He succeeded in bringing socio-economic justice to those who formed part of cooperative dairies. His dream to achieve similar benefits in other sectors remained unfulfilled, however.

There is a poignant twist to the fact of this being the International Year of

The Spirit of Cooperation “I chose to remain in Anand, as an employee of farmers, all my life.

It was the wisest decision I have ever taken.” (I Too Had a Dream)Cooperation, coinciding as it does with Dr. Kurien’s death. It also appears to be the end of an era. Even as the capitalist world continues to nurture and derive benefits from numerous cooperative institutions we have systematically killed the latter in our country, at both operational and conceptual levels. In India, we have lost confidence in the cooperative form of institutions for production, processing, marketing and service delivery. The consequences of centralisation: consolidation in the hands of a few entities – often by privatisation of well-functioning public sector units – and mass production, not production by masses, are all visible in the form of increasing economic and social disparities. Dr. Kurien was convinced “where cooperation fails, there fails the only hope of rural India”. He was also concerned that “as far as multinationals are concerned, money always was and always will be their only God”.

Kurien’s belief in the wisdom of ‘illiterate’ villagers and faith in cooperatives was legendary. He believed “working for the cooperatives was an act of faith”. His conviction regarding such faith led him to advise “to practice greater cooperation,

in case there is a perceived ‘failure’ of cooperatives”. He cautioned the common people and protagonists of the ‘new generation of cooperatives’ to be aware of ‘vested interests’. His strong faith in common people led him to conclude:

“If we are serious, and we cannot be otherwise, planning, resource allocation and implementation of programs have to be done by the people, however incompetent they might be. From the experience of my life, I have seen that villagers can manage their affairs, if they are allowed to do so. Vested interests want to make them weak and our policymakers and people need to be aware of it.”

Lamenting the cause of farmers, workers and those at the bottom of our economic pyramid, he believed that “when the tools of development are placed in the hands of our people and when their energy and wisdom is linked with the skill of committed professionals, there is nothing they cannot achieve”. His view was to weed out those institutions that do not serve


His cooperative dairy movement was aimed at making India the largest milk producer in the world. He was driven, through the institutions he created, to build sustainable competitive advantage of the dairy industry.

22 Network the purpose of uplifting the marginalised and to create new institutions that could serve them better. He did not hesitate to question the relevance of civil service and judiciary in its present form. While making policy makers responsible for the wide socio-economic disparity in our country, he said

“Because policy making is in our hands – in the hands of the elite – and naturally, even unconsciously perhaps; when we make policies that suit us, we usurp the resources of this land somewhat shamelessly to benefit ourselves. The most charitable interpretation of it is that we do it unconsciously.”

He left his imprint of secularism in all the institutions he developed, never allowing the symbolic celebration of religious functions officially. A self-proclaimed atheist he believed in the socio-economic empowerment of the underprivileged section as the greatest religion.

He believed that “a person who does not have respect for time, and does not have a sense of timing, can achieve little”. Maintaining cleanliness, discipline, and adhering to processes and systems in institutions were all sacrosanct to him. In many convocation addresses he would urge students to follow Robert

Frost’s path “less travelled by” and make a difference in the lives of the underprivileged while making a difference in their own lives.

While thinking of and working for the poor, Dr. Kurien never imagined them to live in a weak resource base. When he was criticised for building a five star facility for teaching and training management students at IRMA to work for ‘poor’ people, his characteristic rejoinder would be ‘to get educated in a place where dreaming and thinking of reconstructing our villages will not be constrained by the inadequacies of the physical environment’.

He would attribute the success of any long-term development intervention as the combination of ethical political leadership, a close working relationship between political leaders, technologists and professional managers, integrity of top leadership, and long-term continuance and presence of the leadership at the place of intervention. Referring to his contribution to the success of AMUL and to that of Sri Tribhuvandas Patel’s, the legendary political leader of Gujarat who organised the farmers under the cooperative fold, he proclaimed with characteristic insight and greatness, “There is no difficulty in getting Kuriens but it is rare to get Tribhuvandas Patels”. It undersored his understanding of the role political leaders should play.

How many of the present day

political leaders live up to this

yardstick? Although we know

how difficult it is to get ethical

managers like Dr. Verghese

Kurien in today’s environment,

may institutions and authorities

please take note of the fact

that working for and with the

underprivileged is a ‘marathon’

not a ‘sprint’?

Dr. Kurien remained hopeful

that India would stand among

the world’s most powerful

nations. But his doubt was,

“whether after attaining that

power can we set an example

of how it can be used to build

a better world, a world of

justice and equity- justice and

equity not for a few but for

all?”

The Milkman of India and

the Father of the White

Revolution, Dr. Verghese

Kurien, will remain alive in

our minds as long as we

have socio-economic injustice

in our society along with

pride in being Indians. Dr.

Kurien embodied the spirit

of cooperation in India. The

last two lines of his book, “I

Too Had a Dream”, will be

a reminder for all of us, of

the person he was and the

direction of development that

he pointed to us. “The journey

I began in Anand in 1949 still

continues. I believe it will

continue until we succeed....

Until India’s farmers succeed.”

By: Prof. Haribandhu Panda, Former faculty (IRMA): currently Director, HDF School of Management, Bhubaneswar, Email- [email protected]


By: Indrani Talukdar, Editor, IRMA: Email- [email protected]

Carillon Chimes: A looming presenceThe bells ringing out from the summit of the carillon tower at IRMA

send out waves of hope, joy, and inspiration.

The cotton grey tower ringing out AMUL Carillon Chimes stands tall

at IRMA reminding us of Dr. Kurien’s towering vision and personality. The only tower of its kind in the country (just like IRMA, the only institute of its kind in India), it is more than a monument, embodying excellence, achievement, and much more. When it was installed coinciding with the Institute’s 23rd anniversary (December 14, 2002), the press release read, “...the sound of bells ringing from the height of carillon tower project hope, joy, inspiration, motivation and peace to communities world-wide...” To many IRMAns the tower’s soaring height is a reminder of the high level of achievement their institute has come to symbolise.

The perfect coordination of the 18 clappers to create perfect music has come to represent the harmonious coordination between various systems and sub-systems giving way to perfect deliverance. Dr. Kurien firmly believed in the existence of bells at two places- religious and educational. The Carillon Chimes have anointed the landscaped beauty of IRMA’s campus in that sense.

The history of the carillon goes back all the way to the 16th century, 1510 to be precise. This was in a townhall in Belgium where music was performed on its bells using a baton. Bell towers were used to sound the hour. The carillon’s founders were the celebrated Hemony brothers, Francois and Pierre of France. They,

along with the Dutch nobleman and musician Jacob van Eyck cast the carillon into a full-fledged musical instrument, which they fine-tuned to perfection.

The Amul Carillon Chimes span a series of 18 bells of various sizes manufactured at a Netherlands-based company which happens to be two centuries’ old. Fashioned out of a special alloy these bells are attached to compressed hammers and linked to a computer. The musical scores played out by these bells can be heard at distances over a kilometre. They serve as a reminder of hope, aspiration, and integrity… also the fact that it was Dr. Kurien’s parting gift to this great institution.

Carillon Chimes

24 Network The Inimitable Dr. K

A first batch IRMAn fondly recalls the management maestro and his idiosyncrasies

The most significant events in my life have been by serendipity.

Three events stand tall amongst many. The first is being born to my parents, my first watershed. Their culture, political leanings, value system, mutual respect, optimism, self-confidence, and self-respect, among many other values, have left lasting imprints on my mind. The second watershed of my life was my education at GB Pant University at Pantnagar. A sheer quirk of fate sent me there. The third, and perhaps very significant watershed, has my exposure to IRMA and associated institutions. The enormity of virtues of the institutional scaffolding that got created under the leadership of Dr. Kurien is something that I came to appreciate more and more as I grew older.

I did not reach IRMA by any plan or design. Neither had I heard much about Dr. Kurien or his work when I got a letter from my brother in Delhi in early 1980 advising me to apply to IRMA. For me IRMA held many virtues. Having married on my own will and volition, a one-year management programme with a 600-rupee monthly stipend and an assured job with a1,200-rupee monthly salary thereafter suited me much more than a two-year M.Sc. in Agriculture with a 300-rupee per month ICAR Junior Fellowship and no job assurance at the end, which was my other option. So, after crossing the hurdles of a written test of the objective/multi choice variety,

a group discussion and an interview, I landed a seat in IRMA! The next six years and the subsequent 26 years have been influenced in many

ways by the Maestro of Management and Accomplishment-Dr. Kurien. The Larger impact of his work is well known. I need this space to pen down some of my personal thoughts, feelings, experiences and learning, to synthesise in my own mind the influence one man has in my life.

To begin with, the management education that I received at IRMA was excellent. The mix of reality with theory and application was a mesmerising concoction that impacted most of us in the first batch. We lived life at IRMA with abandon, and probably a disdain for orderly life. It was slowly discovered that the IRMA ‘participants’ were close to the heart of Dr. K and that our raucous follies inside NDDB campus were painfully suffered grudgingly without dissent or digestion by the disciplined lot in the campus. Kurien had chosen the faculty well. The learning was fairly painless, the faculty was friendly yet demanding, and there was a sense of collaboration all round. All of us felt included. I am, in a way, a testimony to their individual and collective accomplishment – imagine a fellow on his honeymoon – some of

my mates taunt me even now about it- on Rural Management education and still managing to scrape through without backlog! My wife and I must

express our sincere gratitude to the silent consent of Dr. K to allow an aberration (all others were day scholars then) and most significantly, dearest Sam (Prof. Sambrani) to take up my case after a particularly emotional encounter (complete with my gesticulations and a pencil flying off my hand) with him in his room and acquiring permission to rent a house to stay with my wife. It was a great example of tolerance. I remain indebted, Dr. Sam and IRMA.

Trust, I believe was an important element among the virtues of Kurien. We soon learnt that he was the one to be trusted too. IRMA decided to shift from a one-year programme to a two-year one. What is more: the faculty consulted us! We were offered the choice of leaving with a one year diploma or staying back with Rs 1200 per month as stipend for the second year. The fair play and the fairness of the offer was something that left an indelible mark. A word given had to be kept, whatever the cost.

The NDDB campus, built much before we had reached the Farmers’ Hostel was a marveland, a testimony

“The management education one received at IRMA was excellent. The mix of reality with theory and

application was a mesmersing concoction.

Remembering the Legend25 Network to the brilliance of the mind behind it. All the houses had cable network to which a TV could be plugged; it also had telephone conduits. The BOHO club ran afternoon movies through the cable network and those at home could relax when their spouses and parents were away at work; there was also a place for car wash, a petrol bunk. Anandalaya was started subsequently so that the wards of those who worked at Anand could get quality schooling. The NDDB building had a maintenance free exterior with moss proof finish. The water would jump over and not flow! One had to marvel at the foresight. Today, as I walk into IRMA, the sprawling lawns, the space available for expansion, the AMUL carillon chimes rendering a unique charismatic character to the splendid campus among other things, I can’t help revering the man whose normal sight was foresight.

I now wish to touch on some anecdotal experiences pertinent to my six years in the institutional framework that Dr. K had created. After having graduated from IRMA I joined GCMMF. A few months into the job and we heard one ‘IRMan’ of the junior batch had been thrown out of the course for some reason or the other. Apparently he had got ‘one’ mark less than the minimum eligibility mark in his qualifying degree. We ‘IRMans’, in and around Anand, got together and protested the injustice to a fellow musketeer. A few days later Chairman “K” summoned us. Amidst much curiosity expressed by the non-IRMANs around us, six or seven first batchers, a few boys and a couple of girls landed in his chamber. Dr. K painstakingly explained to us that the boy being short by one mark was not the

reason for his expulsion. He had misrepresented facts and breached trust. What it amounted to was lack of integrity. He looked at the girls and said, “Pardon me ladies, but integrity is like virginity; it is either there, or it isn’t”. While I was studying at IRMA my father who used to be a journalist and the President of the Ernakulam Press Club met ‘K’ on one of his visits to Kerala. He told K that his son was studying at IRMA. Dr. K is said to have told my father, “You must be proud to breed one like him”.

As is often said, IRMans were his Princes. Going by the virtues of the gentleman, it is a sobriquet I was, am, and will be proud of forever. One day, a GCMMF milk refer-tanker got involved in an accident and it was found that the road tax had not been paid. In those days tax had to be paid in cash and the officer responsible had taken the money and decided to “roll” it for a while. He was promptly fired. Everybody knew, however, that the guy was smart, efficient, a go-getter, and helpful: he had a two-wheeler with a boat-like attachment in which he would offer his lady colleagues a lift to the office and back. So, he had friends. The friends went to Dr. K and pleaded leniency citing the guy’s virtues of being smart and brilliant. Dr. K dismissed them with a one liner: “All crooks are smart; else they could not be crooks”.

I remember having seen a letter he wrote to the chairman of Hindustan Motors in 1983 or 84. He had written: “I had an occasion to travel in one of the Contessa cars you make. It rattles a lot. Please send me three white well-fitted Contessa Cars.” The scathing message was

probably his way of opposing some diktat that forced him to buy those cars. At IRMA, once, the entire batch was transported to Ahmedabad to attend a meeting of the Indian Dairy Association. He came a little late to the conference and said, “My apologies for being late; I was on time, my mistake was I did not factor in Indian Airlines.” He went on to demolish many criticisms during his hour-long, wonderful oration. I recall his saying that the Peugeot was a better car than Ambassador and that if it came cheaper as a gift from a donor, “it makes it even more comfortable.” This was his response to his critics who denounced him for travelling in luxury cars. His speech met with loud applause on several occasions from us IRMans, who filled half the hall. In retrospect, I suspect that was perhaps the purpose of taking us there! Once, while at GCMMF, I saw a two-page note in English that had come back from him with a cryptic remark, “Please write in English”!

After I had left GCMMF in 1986 and joined NABARD I wrote to him requesting his help regarding starting a spastic society. He wrote back personally expressing NDDB’s inability to help, explaining why, and wishing me luck. I had not expected a personally signed letter from him. It was his regard for IRMans that he had signed it himself. I have kept that letter as a treasure with me. During my GCMMF tenure I had heard about an incident in which K overheard inside the lift of the GCMMF office in Mumbai (where he had a guesthouse) two wholesale dealers conversing about the unfair supply of AMUL stocks in Mumbai. Saying nothing to the gentlemen Dr.

26 Network K quietly set an enquiry in place. It was soon discovered that the stocks were first supplied to a few dealers who would send them to the Crawford market, a re-distribution hub, and these stocks would reach other areas before the dealers in those areas could get them. I had also heard that K would send for the reject list of candidates and demand an explanation on why they were rejected in any promotion exercise in NDDB rather than asking who got selected. These are hearsay. But there are several lessons I learnt from these anecdotes. Dr. K’s personality is never complete without the exhibition of tinges of arrogance. Once he visited the computer center and the person in charge offered him a sofa. He was, it is said, flabbergasted at the retort, “I own this place”! To my mind, the arrogance and the firmness of his approach, among many other virtues insulated the framework he had built from several incursions that would have spoiled its success.

As I lead and manage my present organisation, his spirit, his values, his perspective, analysing, his foresight,

and his ability to think of the bigger picture continue to influence me. In fact, Dr. K helps me to remain grounded, rooted to a cause. The relevance of the institutions he built continues to amaze and excite me; particularly when I see that the bulk of India’s producers, be it in agriculture, non-farm or the services’ sector, cannot prosper unless their outputs are aggregated and institutions built for their marketing. I look at the amazing institutional scaffolding he was instrumental in building to make such aggregation and impact possible in the dairy sector. Such arrangements are woefully inadequate or absent in any other commodity or sector. I realise every day that Dr. K is relevant today and will remain relevant so long as there are small producers in this world. Finally a word about rural management. Irrespective of claimants and claims that others may have, I firmly believe that K is the father of modern rural management education. As a first batcher, I understood rural management education as one where you learned the best of management

By: C P Mohan (PRM01), Managing Director, NABARD Financial Services, Bangalore, Email- [email protected]

theories, application, and practices and became a multi-specialist in all management faculties. The delivery of that education had to have significant relevance to the rural context and realities. This was necessary as those ending up in rural institutions would not have the luxury of specialists in each management faculty supporting them. Dr. K also saw rural management as a means of bringing modern education to the benefit of the poor and disadvantaged sections. His work resulted in massive poverty reduction, yet he did not target poverty; he improved livelihoods in a sustainable way that has lasted many decades. In that sense, and considering the continuing relevance of rural institutions in India, rural management must be treated as a public good and there must be policy focus and space about it.

My last meeting with Dr. Kurien was in February 2012. I had visited him with a bouquet of 101 roses- 101 being a number associated with divinity and God. May I end this, Dr. K, with a tear in my eye and resolve in my heart!

Remembering the Legend27 Network Koffee with Kurien

A brilliant, verbatim account of a conversation with the Dairy King

In 2003, I was working with an

institution called the Centre for

Development Studies and Activities

(CDSA), located in Pune. Affiliated

to the University of Pune, CDSA

offers a Master’s Programme

in Development Planning and

Administration. I was teaching

courses on Research Methodology,

Statistics and also a Laboratory on

Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA).

Besides this, I was in the midst of

registering an NGO called SPROUT

– Society for Participatory Rural or

Urban Governance.

While speaking with the Executive

Director, Prof. Aneeta Gokhale-

Benninger (AGB) one morning, I

mentioned my intention to set up

an NGO. AGB suggested that I

should meet Dr Kurien and seek

his support for this initiative. I was

apprehensive of this suggestion

but when it was repeated a second

time I realised it was sound. I sent

off a letter to Dr K, requesting an

appointment and forgot about the

matter. Within a week I received a

letter informing me the date and time

of the appointment. That is when I

got nervous. It is one thing to meet

Dr K in a group or a crowd and

quite another to do it one-on-one. I

wasn’t sure if I wanted to do that.

I shared this sense of unease with

AGB, who asked me to get in touch

with someone who knew both me

and Dr K. So, I got in touch with

Prof M J Arul, to whom I was close.

Prof. Arul (who taught IGB at IRMA)

asked me what my problem was. I

told him of my sense of unease. He

asked me what my thoughts/views

of Dr K. were. I told him I was an

admirer, a fan. Prof. Arul told me

that in that case there was nothing

to worry about. He asked me to go

ahead without any hesitation.

It was the summer of 2003 and the

summer vacations had started. I was

unable to get a confirmed reservation

for the date of my meeting but

decided to proceed nonetheless.

Taking a rickshaw from the Anand

Railway Station I reached the IRMA

gates. I was visiting my alma mater

after a gap of 15 years, having

visited it last in 2008. As I walked

down the boulevard leading to the

Institute buildings I felt goose-pimples

all over. Myriad memories flashed

through my mind about my stay there

from 1984-86. Batch-mates, faculty,

surprise quizzes, assignments, Field

Work, MTS, the Mess, tea @ 4pm,

volley-ball, the letter from the VC of

the Gujarat Agricultural University

(Anand Agricultural University was

Gujarat Agricultural University then)

complaining about the empty booze

bottles being tossed over the wall by

my batch-mates/seniors, friendships

and heart-breaks, grades, TAU, the

IRMA written test, the drowning of

my batch-mate during a picnic, the

interview which I cleared to get an

admission to IRMA, the beautiful

girls and the handsome young men

who were my batch-mates and

seniors……..

I opted to stay at the hostel, to

connect with my past. The ETDC

was not for me. The appointment

was scheduled for the next day at

4 pm.

I reached the Chairman’s Office at

3.50 pm, not wanting to be late.

In spite of all the counselling there

were butterflies in my stomach. I met

Joseph (Dr K’s PA), who welcomed

me and made me comfortable. I

enquired about the tall structure that

made music at periodic intervals

and was told that it was a “carillon”.

Carillons are found in Europe at

institutions of excellence and their

sound/music is heard far and wide.

Dr K wanted one for IRMA and a

special set of people had created it.

The chimes were computer controlled

and the lighting was done by Philips.

Joseph also made a mention of the

“fight/altercation” between Dr K and

Amrita Patel. It used to appear in the

national newspapers occasionally.

Joseph asked me to knock the

door at 4 exactly pm and enter Dr

Kurien’s office.

The following conversation took

place between Meher Gadekar and

Dr Kurien (VK) in the summer of

2003 (~April) at Chairman’s Office,

IRMA.

28 Network MG: Good afternoon Sir!

VK: Good afternoon, young man. Please take a seat.

MG: Thank you. I’m Meher Gadekar from PRM 5. I live and work in Pune.

VK: Umm. Pune is a beautiful city.

MG: It used to be more beautiful but with the current problems it faces, its beauty is diminishing rapidly.

VK: I’m sure you and the citizens of Pune will deal with the issues that you mention. So what brings you to Anand?

MG: I’ve come to meet you

VK: And what can I do for you?

MG: Sir, I’m in the process of setting up an NGO called SPROUT, short for Society for Participatory Rural or Urban Transformation. I’ve come to seek your blessings and also to find out in what ways IRMA can support me in this venture.

VK: Good. What do you plan to do?

MG: We propose to empower vulnerable, marginalised, and disadvantaged people in Rural and Urban areas through participatory capacity building processes. This would lead to their socio-economic development over a period of time. As a result there would be a transformation of the persistent/chronic pockets of poverty in the rural and urban areas. Once these last bastions of under-development are developed then India would be firmly on the road to inclusive all-round development.

VK: Sounds good. Are there any people supporting you in this venture?

MG: Yes, I’ve been able to bring together a small but fairly good and

competent group of people who have agreed to support this initiative.

VK: OK, so what do you want from me?

MG: I’d like IRMA to support such ventures through their early days. We have ideas and we have gathered a competent group of people who are willing to lend their time, expertise and energy. But we don’t have money. If we could have some financial assistance in the first few years we would be able to roll along comfortably thereafter.

VK: Ummm. You have good ideas. But why do you want to set up an NGO? Why not a Cooperative?

MG: I think it is the most appropriate form of organisation for the type of work that we wish to do.

VK: But that’s not true. Any NGO can be superseded by the Charity Commissioner. Besides, this form does not further the principles of democracy, ownership, equality and equity as well as a cooperative does.

MG: I agree but most initiatives of the type that I want to undertake are registered as NGOs. Besides, it is easier to attract financial support, when you’re registered as an NGO.

VK: I agree. But as a form of organisation an NGO do not match the strength, flexibility and robustness of a cooperative.

MG: True, I am aware of the advantages. But we’ve decided to register SPROUT as an NGO. I’ve got the necessary forms from the Charity Commissioner’s Office in Pune. I’ve also drafted the Trust Deed comprising of the Aims & Objectives, Memorandum of Association, etc.

VK: OK, but you know where my

preference lies…..

MG: Yes, I do, Sir. Nevertheless, we’d like it to be an NGO.

VK: Good luck to you, Mr Gadekar.

MG: Sir, besides your good wishes, I also want your support.

VK: Let me see what I can do. (presses the bell, and Joseph appears). Connect him to Bharat Nirman…. (I don’t remember the exact name). Joseph will help you to do so.

MG: Thank you Sir. That is very kind of you.

VK: Of course not. You are my Princes (and Princesses). You have a right to the best education and infrastructure in the world. And you have a right to meet me and seek my support, as long as you support the cause of farmers and the rural populace. That is why IRMA was created.

MG: Sure Sir. I am aware of that.

VK: So what do you think is wrong with India?

MG: Economically we seem to be doing well in some sectors. But agriculture is suffering. The terms of trade are adverse. In Maharashtra, farmers are committing suicide. Development is neither even, nor inclusive. Many groups like the SCs, STs, and minorities have not yet enjoyed the fruits of development in spite of over 50 years of Independence.

VK: Ummm. Who is responsible for this state of affairs?

MG: The government is not responsive to the people’s needs

VK: Who runs the government?

MG: The IAS

Remembering the Legend29 Network VK: And what do you think of the IAS?

MG: I consider them to be Brown Sahibs. They want to rule the people, the citizens, whereas they should be involved in developing them.

VK: But aren’t they Public Servants? Civil Servants?

MG: They are, but they behave like Masters, like Kings

VK: So what can be done?

MG: I don’t know, in specific terms

VK: I do. Disband the IAS (shocked silence)

MG: (taken aback) What? Then who will run the country?

VK: A different cadre which, besides being professionally trained, is also empathetic to the rural areas, to farmers.

MG: OK. But where do we find this cadre?

VK: (smiles) We are creating it. That’s why IRMA was created (looks triumphant). You should be running and administering the country. That is IRMA’s mandate.

MG: Umm. (feels proud and strong, but also uneasy. Disbanding the IAS and replacing it by Irmans is easier said than done).

VK: Who were your batch-mates?

MG: Bhanot, Manjul Bajaj, Daman Singh… (names the most famous)

VK: Oh yes, I know Daman (daughter of Dr Manmohan Singh). She comes from a good family. There was never a problem when she was at IRMA. The family respected all our rules and regulations and did not ask for any concessions or special privileges.

MG: I had the good fortune of doing Field Work with Daman in Bikaner. Field Work was the best and most intense learning experience that I’ve had in my life. Especially considering that I had never visited a village in my life, prior to joining IRMA.

VK: (smiles) That is what it was designed to be. And who are in your senior batch?

MG: Nitya Swaminathan, Sudhir Rao, Apoorva Oza….

VK: I know Nitya. Her father (Dr. M S Swaminathan) is a very respected Agricultural Scientist of India.

MG: (glances down at his watch, which shows that ~75 minutes have elapsed, since the meeting with Dr K started) Sir, I have taken a lot of your valuable time, and would like to take your leave. You have been very kind to meet me.

VK: Not at all. All of you have access to me. Do feel free to get in touch whenever you wish to.

MG: Sir, I have brought some mangoes for you (puts a polythene bag of mangoes on the table)

VK: Are they Alphonso mangoes?

MG: I’m afraid not sir. I was not able to get a confirmed train reservation for the journey to Anand from Pune. Hence I came in an un-reserved compartment. I have got these mangoes from the local market at Anand.

VK: Thank you very much. All my very best wishes to you in your endeavours

MG: Thank you so much, sir. It has been a privilege to meet you and I will cherish memories of this meeting.

By: Meher Gadekar (PRM 5), currently advisor to the NGO-SDRI; Founder Director o the Social Enterprise, Sustainable Future. Email- [email protected]

I depart from the room and join Joseph in his office. Joseph asks me how it went and I say that it went off well. A bell buzzes and Joseph is summoned by Dr K. He emerges after some time and gives me the contact details of the NGO mentioned by Dr K. Dr APJ Abdul Kalam is associated with this NGO. As we’re talking Dr K emerges and starts walking towards the elevator. Since we’re through with our conversation Joseph nudges me towards it (the elevator). I am reluctant, but with Joseph’s prodding, follow Dr K and enter the lift. It carries us to the ground floor, where his car is waiting. Dr K walks towards the setting sun, towards his waiting car. I look towards him as he departs and then walk towards the hostel, which has been my home since I arrived at IRMA last evening. Did I see a halo around His head, when he was walking towards His car?

“Dr. Kurien has pioneered the way by both pointing ‘to the need for professionalism in the management of agriculture and, more significantly, by doing something about it in the shape of this Institute. But the scale of our requirements strongly suggests that we need more IRMAs, or at any rate more institutions that are similarly structured and motivated”.

– Shri R Venkataraman, The President of India7th Annual Convocation Address, 1988

30 Network A Magnetic Personality

A free-wheeling interview with Dr. KD Balchandani, IRMA’s resident doctor, who was a personal friend of Dr. Kurien’s.

As a young doctor I first met Dr Kurien at the Tribhuvandas

foundation. As Dr Kurien was busy with a ministerial delegate I was granted an audience with him for only fifteen minutes. However, the meeting extended for a good 45 minutes or so. Dr Kurien listened to my views on rural development with rapt attention, interjecting only sporadically. Later on I got to know from the then IRMA Director, Mr. Haldipur, that Dr Kurien had recounted the “interesting views of a young doctor on rural development” during a meeting held at the Aga Khan Foundation. It was indeed a great morale booster for me. During the several occasions I interacted with him, he came across as an avid listener.

IRMA was undoubtedly Dr Kurien’s baby. During IRMA’s early days I remember his making weekend sojourns to IRMA with guests, both from India and abroad. One such guest was Mr. Romi Pillai, a magistrate in London associated with several social and developmental activities. I was instructed by Dr. Kurien to show Mr. Pillai the rural hinterland of Anand District and the developmental work being carried out therein. I drove Mr. Pillai to the rural areas and tried to present an honest picture of rural development, or lack of it, and the work done by us in the villages. That very evening, I found, to my utter surprise, Mr. Haldipur in my house. I was sure that it was related to the morning visit and felt quite apprehensive. But my concerns

turned out to be unfounded when Mr. Haldipur conveyed Dr. Kurien’s instruction regarding taking Mr Pillai, who’d been highly impressed with

the visit, for another more trip on which he wished me to accompany him yet again.

Circumstances forced me to make an unceremonious exit from Vidyanagar Municipal hospital which put me in a low state of mind. I was called by Dr. Kurien who asked me what I intended to do next. I replied “possibly something on my own”. Dr. Kurien then asked, “How much money would you need for this?” I said, “I do not need any money”. Dr. Kurien, however, was insistent. He called his secretary Joseph and asked him to release Rs 10 lakh. Though I did eventually convince him that I did not need the money I realised that here was a fatherly figure who would always stand by me.

He would engage me in several lengthy conversations, so much so that his wife often gently chided him, “Let him go, he has to work!”

Even after Dr Kurien left IRMA I continued to regularly visit him at his home. During the fag end of his life he had stopped recognising a lot of people, but I am happy to say that he continued to recognise me till the very end. Whenever I visited him he

always quipped, “So how are you, Doctor?” He had virtually stopped eating. Since both of us shared diabetes I would jocularly remark,

“Do you want rabdi, or kulfi?” to which he would nod slowly implying an affirmative response. I would rush out and purchase a sugar free kulfi which I would carry inside a thermos. His wife later remarked, “These days he wants to eat only kulfi!”

Quite often his eyes said it all, even more than his words. He was committed to honesty, sincerity and integrity. He was truly a magnetic personality.

By: Prof. Anand Venkatesh, Associate Professor, IRMA, Email- [email protected]

Since both of us shared diabetes I would jocularly remark, “Do you want rabdi, or kulfi?” to which he would nod

slowly in the affirmative.

“When this Board was established, no doubt I had great expectations from this Board but this has gone beyond all my expectations. That is mainly due if I may say so, all of you would agree, because of the leadership provided by the visionary, Dr. V. Kurien. This Institution has now a global recognition for excellence in the field of dairy development, and not only the Institution has won recognition, the architect of that Institution, Dr. Kurien also received world wide recognition”.

– Shir C. Subramaniam,Secretary, GOI

6th Annual Convocation Address, 1987


“Make a Promise”

Who will fill the void

Now that you have gone?

Your loved ones cannot help but ask:

How will the void be borne?

So many years have rolled by

Basking in adoring veneration

Will that sea of ardour now

Wash up wasted, sans recognition?

The brilliant lamp that you were

Who ignited a million others

In the eye of the storm, however,

Who else could have that power?

This world has been able to witness

Dreams turning into tangible substance

What dream will these eyes hold;

Forlorn for want of sustenance?

Make a promise oh ‘Verghese’!

To this son of the earth

That it is here you will return

Unfailingly, in your next birth.

Paresh J. Bhatt(Translated by Indrani Talukdar)

‘§¼Ý¢ ±¢Î¢ ÜUÚ Îï’

¼é Ýãèæ ¼¢ï ç…‹Îx¢è }¢ïæ¥¢ñÚ v²¢ Úã …¢²x¢¢,

ç…„Ýï ¼éÛ¢ÜU¢ï çÎH „ï ™¢ã¢v²¢ ±¢ï ²ï „ã Ð¢²x¢¢ J

çÜU¼Ýï Ï¢Ú„¢ïæ ¼ïÚè ™¢ã¼ÜUï Ý…¢Úï Îï¶ï ãñæ,

v²¢ ±¢ï ™¢ã¼ ÜU¢ „}¢‹ÎÚ}¢éz¼ }¢ïæ Ï¢ã …¢²x¢¢ J

»ÜU ÎèÐÜU „ï ²ã¢æ ÐÚÎèÐ}¢¢H¢ Ï¢Ý x¢§ü,

¥¢¡ç{²¢ïæ ÜUè Ú¢ã }¢ïæv²¢ ±¢ï ÎèÐ …H Ð¢²x¢¢ J

§„ …ã¢¡ Ýï Îï¶¢ ãñw±¢Ï¢ ãÜUèÜU¼ }¢ïæ Ï¢ÎH¼ï,

„êÝè ¥¢¶¢ïæ }¢ïæ ÜUã¢¡ÜU¢ï§ü w±¢Ï¢ ¥Ï¢ ÐH Ð¢²x¢¢ J

§¼Ý¢ ±¢Î¢ ÜUÚÎï ±x¢èü„§„ {Ú¢ ÜUï Ðê¼ „ï,

»ÜU ¥±„Ú ç}¢H x¢²¢ ¼¢ïH¢ñÅ ÜUÚ çÈUÚ ¥¢²x¢¢ J

ÐÚïà¢ …. |¢^ *

*Associate Professor, Institute of Rural Management, Anand

32 Network Undeniably Unforgettable

A moving homage to the late Dr. Kurien by a student

I had my first brush with Dr. Kurien’s name in my fifth grade.

It was the day my class teacher announced a forthcoming General Knowledge test. Buying a GK book from the neighbourhood store was the next step, after which I began swotting in earnest. Guided (or perhaps misguided) by the notion that Indian names were easier to commit to memory - Father of the Indian Green Revolution-Dr M.S. Swaminathan, now that was pretty easy – that’s where I began. Then my eye fell upon an entry: Father of the White Revolution-Dr Verghese Kurien. Now, how on earth was I supposed to remember that? The name sounded so alien, so foreign

to my ten-year-old brain. The next morning I managed to miss the cut-off for the GK test by half a mark all because I had failed to commit the name of the great man to memory.

That was my first encounter with the name “Dr. Verghese Kurien.” Undeniably unforgettable.

Eleven long years passed in a state of blissful ignorance, without my ever having bothered to find out much about this extraordinary man. Till my last undergraduate year when I began preparing for B school examinations after having relentlessly scrutinised the best business schools in the country. One of the schools I checked out

was IRMA. Going into its website I came across these words:

“IRMA is founded with the belief, borne out by Dr. Kurien’s work in the dairy co-operatives which revolutionized the dairy industry in the country, that the key for effective rural development is professional management...”

I was reading that esteemed name after so many years! That very instant I developed an affinity with the institute and wanted it to be part of my destiny. I followed up my intuition by net surfing every bit of information I could find on the Milkman of India only to be astounded with his never-ending

The ‘K’ factor

Remembering the Legend33 Network list of achievements and accolades. I learned how the creator of the Amul brand had been motivated to build an institute dedicated to rural management and development. I was determined to be part of the IRMA legacy.

On November 13, 2011 I took the entrance test for IRMA with all the enthusiasm of a fifth grader that I once was sitting for a much-sought GK test. I knew in my gut that my chances were brighter this time round. I hadn’t miscalculated. I got called for the final interview on February 3, 2012. What I felt stepping inside the campus cannot be described in mere words. As my eyes took in the chic edifice and the sylvan surroundings they saw more... They saw the values of that great visionary; values that were on display right at the main gate. The warmth of the guards and their attentiveness served as indicators regarding what to expect inside. I noticed the Carillon Chimes a little later. A clutch of students standing next to them told me the story of the chimes and how much Dr. Kurien had wanted them to be part

By: Anshul Malik (PRM 33): Email- [email protected]

Dr. Kurien with Family

of IRMA. To me, the chimes signified one of his most significant values- punctuality. I learnt more about Dr. Kurien and his dream. Waiting for my results I filled up my time reading I Too Had a Dream and watching the film Manthan which, I thought, could easily have portrayed Dr. Kurien in the lead role. Each passing day brought in fresh bouts of anxiety- anxiety to become part of the great man’s legacy.

Come March 21, 2012 and the results were out. When I read “Congratulations” against my name I yelled out to my mother that I had made it to IRMA. I had other options – equally great – but my mind was made up. The very next morning I mailed a DD with my first-term fee and confirmation letter, being the first in my batch to do so.

On joining IRMA I could sense the “Kurien factor” seeping through via the loyalty, integrity, and spirit inspired by the institute. Everybody in my batch, not just me, believed it to be part of the legacy and vision of the past 32 years. Nobody had the heart to break it.

Today, I am not only a proud IRMan but a proud denizen of Anand, the city where AMUL (Anand Milk Union Limited) originated. To most people who are unaware of Anand I take the pains of telling them, “I live in the place created by the great milkman of India.”

All good things come to an end. I realised this with a shock when, on September 9, 2012, my eyes froze over the mess notice board that read: “On the sad demise of Dr Kurien, we all will be meeting @10 and will all head to Amul”. I, like most of PRM 33, felt orphaned, desolate. Our father figure, whom we’d never met, had left us. As the entire IRMA fraternity gathered around the chimes the following evening paying homage to him I realised that though the void will never get filled his values and aspirations will always remain in place. IRMA is not just a B school; it is a temple of values. We, i.e. PRM 33 and subsequent batches of students may have missed Dr. Kurien’s awesome presence but not his values of integrity, punctuality, and passion. We salute him.

34 Network The Utterly Butterly Man

‘Again and again in history, some special people in the crowd wake up. They have no ground in the crowd and they emerge accordingly to much broader laws; they carry strange customs with them, and

demand room for bold actions. The future ruthlessly speaks through them. They save the world.’ – (Rainer Maria Rilke)

Perhaps there is no better way to describe a man with such an

iconic personality. To turn a barren land into a land overflowing with milk, to empower millions of farmers across the country to form a co-operative with an annual turnover of over 13,000 crores, to turn an ordinary farmer into the owner of the biggest co-operative... Dr. Kurien had all those qualities and more. This was the man who gave us the ‘Taste of India’

His entry into the dairy sector was accidental and not very pleasant. He was forced to study dairy technology as the Government of India would only allow scholarships for the discipline. Yet he managed to study metallurgical and nuclear engineering at the Michigan State University. Later on he was sent to New Zealand for training on dairy technology. Ironically enough, the man who sold milk to billions of people regularly across the globe himself disliked drinking milk being lactose intolerant.

Dr. Kurien was born on 26th November, 1921 to a Syrian Christian family in Kozhikode, Kerala. But this Keralite developed a new identity, much to his dislike initially, with a dusty, sleepy city, Anand, on 13th May, 1949, when he was sent by the Government of India to work at a creamery in Kheda. Being a beef-eating Christian who did not know

Gujarati and a bachelor to boot, no one was ready to keep him as a paying guest. He was staying in a garage, which is now part of the Amul museum. Not happy with his job he would send out letters demanding his own resignation. Whenever he got bored he would make an exit to Bombay (now Mumbai).

Finally, when his resignation was approved and he was about to leave Anand, Tribhubhandas Patel, the man who brought the farmers together to start the co-operative movement stopped him. “Don’t go Kurien, Anand needs you”, that’s what he said. These were the words that later changed the course of history. They were – in a way – responsible for a billion-litre idea popularly known as ‘Operation Flood’.

Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru who visited Anand to inaugurate the Amul plant, embraced him. Dr. Kurien, together with a dairy technologist, HM Dallaya, made history by creating milk powder from buffalo milk. Amul started weaving its success story and India, from being a milk importing nation, surpassed USA to become the largest producer of milk in the world. The success of Amul was so intriguing that the then Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri spent one night at a village to understand the recipe of its success. Later on, at his request, Dr Kurien set up the

National Dairy Development Board in 1965 to replicate its success across the country.

Dr Kurien was of the view that professionals should come forward to lead and to work for rural India before they started looking for greener pastures. He was on the board of IIM, Ahmedabad when he once tried to make students understand the need to fill the gap and work for rural India. A fellow board member, who was puffing away at a cigar, quipped whether he wanted students to milk cows. Dr Kurien, who was known for his sense of humour, replied that they should continue smoking cigars while “we milked the cows”. To address this gap he set up the Institute of Rural Management, Anand in 1979 to train professionals to work for the rural sector. He once said, ‘Students of IRMA should lead. Of course, when you lead you have to walk with others. You cannot lead unless you work with others.’ Under his guidance this institute gained momentum to become one of the country’s best management institutes, of course the best in its league. This is probably the only management institute with chimes present in the campus. Dr. Kurien firmly believed in the significance of bells at two places- religious and educational.

”Co-operatives was an act of faith for me, it continues to be so.

Remembering the Legend35 Network As I see it, faith is belief without reason. For those who believe no explanation is necessary, for those who don’t no explanation is possible. My unfinished dream will only be accomplished when the farmers of India have a level playing field to compete with other forms of business. People may call me cold blooded, but I am very firm in setting precedence....” were his words. Dr Kurien was a bitter critic of liberalisation and globalisation as he felt that it would be unfair for Indian companies to compete with multinationals. However, that did not mean that he was afraid of competition. Once when Nestle suggested to him that they work together he replied that they were already working together and they could only meet at competition. Such was the confidence of the man. In 2006 he had had to quit the post of chairman of GCMMF. He hinted at a political conspiracy coupled embroiled with former friends turning foes, which led him to take such a decision.

He was a man ‘of the farmer, for the farmer, by the farmer.’ He would say, “We must build on the resources represented by our young professionals and by our nation’s farmers, without their involvement we cannot succeed, with their involvement we cannot fail.”

The success story of the co-operative movement attracted Shyam Benegal and he was eager to make a film on it but lacked the money for it. Approximately 10 lakhs were required to make the film at the time. When Dr Kurien came to know he collected Rs 2 from half a million farmers and helped him to make the film. The film Manthan was first made in Gujarati.

Later on its success encouraged Benegal to release it nationwide in Hindi. This was probably the first time that farmers were producers of a movie and people were eager to watch it as they themselves were its producers.

During his lifetime Dr Kurien had been showered with many accolades- Padma Bibhushan, the Ramón Magsaysay award, and the World Food Prize to name a few. Yet there are people like N.R.Narayanmurthy who aver that no one deserved the Bharat Ratna more than Dr Kurien. He had 17 honorary doctorates to his name.

On 9th September, 2012 the milkman

of India left us. But he remains an

immortal flame burning in the hearts

of millions and a source of inspiration

for generations to come. He once

said, “The journey I began in Anand

in 1949 still continues. I believe it

will continue until we succeed, until

India’s farmers succeed.’ And this

will echo in our minds forever.

Mero gaam Katha Pareey

Jahaan dudh ki nadiya baahe

Jahaan koyal kooh kooh gaye

Mahre ghar angna na bhulo na

By: Priyam Mukherji (PRM 33): Email- [email protected]

The man who sold milk to billions of people regularly across the globe himself disliked drinking milk.

36 Network Amul is a Woman Thing

The significance of Woman Power dawned on the Milkman of India when he heard some “hard working village women” from the Kaira District villages.

Many decades ago in the late 70’s, we at ISST were looking

for and building up case studies of successful endeavours by women in large numbers. Our belief at the time was that success stories could not only lead to some self confidence but point the way on ‘how to’. Then we saw the ideas and critiques from Manthan and thanks to that exposure we decided to look at the Amul project. Another famous patron of the democratic cooperative movement of India, Lakshmi Jain, a long time close friend and ally of Verghese Kurien, introduced me to Dr. Kurien and arranged a visit to Anand.

While Dr. Kurien connected us to his colleagues in the management of the cooperative dairy activities he himself did not try to meet us. The ‘woman thing’ had not hit him, yet. However, in collaboration with another great builder of democratic institutions, Ela Bhatt, and supported by a UN agency we decided to hold a rural women’s conference at Anand and requested that we be allowed to use a hall in the main office building. For the conference we invited some 20-30 women members of the cooperatives in Anand who were the milk producers, who in fact, were the base of Operation Flood We also had some SEWA cadres and my own colleagues from the ISST. We invited Dr. Kurien to inaugurate the conference to which he came reluctantly to sit with us, saying to me, “They cannot speak,

they are ‘just hardworking village women’. I said to him: “Wait and see”.

Standing Mikes were placed in the hall, and after an introduction, the conference opened, and within a minute, without so much as a by-your-leave, the women, all rearers of buffaloes and milk “maids” queued up to speak describing the work, benefits, and issues that needed to be addressed. We could not stop them. This was the first time they actually saw/met the Malik, the Sahab. It has to be said to the credit of my dear brother and later a very close associate, Verghese Kurien, that though initially stunned, he was exhilarated later. He was excited

by the fact that these were the ‘workers’ on whom his brilliant White Revolution was built. He immediately put his entire organisation at our service. Our research staff moved to the villages, given a ride on the milk vans, interviewed women milk producers; his technical staff gave us the details of production, sales, and rewards. We learnt about the Anand pattern of building cooperatives and wrote about them and the women in a book called Women’s Quest for Power calling them our Milkmaids of Kaira district.

Our study essay, field work, interviews with the milk producers revealed that adding a buffalo to the household of a landless farmer

While Dr. Kurien introduced us to his colleagues in the management of the cooperative dairy activities he himself did not try to meet us. The ‘woman thing’ had not hit him, yet.

Remembering the Legend37 Network added about 3-4 hours more work for a woman in the family. This had serious effects on her health and longevity – as the figures revealed. We brought this to the attention of Dr Kurien and his colleagues and soon the Tribhovan Foundation set up a health service for the villages and took particular note of this phenomenon of increased burden on a woman’s time of additional income generating activities which, in fact, is universal amongst acute poverty households.

Dr. Kurien later affirmed that what became known as the White Revolution, Operation Flood, the greatest and most successful cooperative endeavour in the world, was almost entirely due to the commitment of women who not only work most dedicatedly to augment their family incomes but are also able to work together. It is a phenomenon that gets repeated again and again when we see how women come together, struggle yet try as in self help groups, apart from

other collective activities, to use the collective mode.

Over the decades Dr. Kurien and I worked together - notably with the National Foundation of India which he helped to found; our orbits intersected at many other public spaces due to the work he did along with my husband L C Jain to revive genuine cooperation. Some decades later and with that inimitable twinkle in his eye he told me “Devaki you must come back and visit us. We have a feminist now in the family”. This was his daughter Nirmala who, coming back from college, was exhibiting the characteristics of a strong feminist, which delighted him.

Since we have projects like Amul and since we have accolades being given to Dr. Kurien in the obituaries why are we still seeking Walmart to help us organise for production, transport and sales? The women producers of Kaira live and work from their homes, own their buffaloes, live on their land, get regular incomes while the rest of us in India

By: Dr. Devaki Jain (Economist and development activist, and the founder of the Institute of Social Studies Trust), Email- [email protected]

and the world get their products. Surely, here is a farm gate to the consumers’ door model? Surely we could do this for our tomatoes and potatoes if not for our chillies and other farm products? A democratic cooperative structure at the product base, and the other elements that Prof. Alagh, the outgoing Chairman of IRMA, an academic centre that was also enabled by Dr Kurien, has so well described could, in fact, lead to fantastic rural product success stories.

Maybe there is another Verghese Kurien in the scenario, somewhere, who would like to battle it out for bringing the Anand pattern into other agricultural products- and he/she may get the Bharat Ratna for overpowering the Walmart model with our own home grown model - for another operation flood, but a flood of other food products .This would be the most appropriate way to honour the memory of Dr Verghese Kurien, the milk man of India.

38 Network ‘I Too Had A Dream’: Book Review

I offer this review as a tribute to the ‘father of the white revolution’. Dr.

Verghese Kurien was born in Calicut, Kerala, graduated in Science from Madras University and Engineering from Michigan State University, USA. He began his career at Anand, Gujarat as a manager in government’s creamery, and soon joined the Kaira District Cooperative Milk Producers’ Union Limited (now ‘Amul’). Later, he became the chairman of National Dairy Development Board (NDDB). Among the numerous awards, the Padma Vibhushan (1999) was the last to be received by him. In this book ‘I Too Had a Dream’, his life events are wonderfully unravelled out by the Mumbai-based freelance journalist, Gouri Salvi. Gouri Salvi has worked with magazines like Onlooker and Sunday, among others.

‘I Too Had a Dream’, while narrating Dr. Kurien’s role in shaping the dairy industry, illustrates the concept of institutional building and social entrepreneurship. It elaborates on how an individual with personal integrity along with commitment, dedication, and national spirit can bring about social change. It clearly explains how being honest to oneself is basic to being honest with others which, in turn, helps one face the challenge of bringing people together on board and managing them in the form of cooperatives as opposed to corporations.

A few driving principles in the life of Dr. Kurien may be observed as follows:

Viewing life as a privilege and to waste it would be wrong. While accepting any responsibility it is

important to optimise one’s talents and contribute to the common good. Failure is all about doing it to the contrary.

Being brave enough to love and strong enough to rejoice in others’ happiness gives way to the realisation that there is enough for all. The book commences with Dr Kurien receiving a scholarship under the ‘Colombo Plan’ in 1952 to go to New Zealand. This sowed the kernel for the future launch of Asia’s first largest dairy, also the first plant to produce milk powder from buffalo milk- a humongous innovation in the dairy industry. Bringing all the milk producers together, tapping their resources to own and run the

cooperative confirmed Dr. Kurien’s ideology - “When you work for your own profit, the pleasure is transitory; but if you work for others there is a deeper sense of fulfilment”. Another innovation was the introduction of the baby food formula that led to designing the inimitable Amul mascot, the chubby little girl in pony tail.

The formation of the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB), India’s largest employment scheme, was another landmark. As was the revival of the Delhi Milk Scheme (DMS) within 42 days employing 92 experts on a shift basis. Inherent within every challenge exists an opportunity highlighting the significance of immediate corrective action.

Being brave enough to love and strong enough to rejoice in others’ happiness gives way to the realisation that there is enough for all.

Remembering the Legend39 Network The book presents how vested interests and bureaucracy tried to dog Dr. Kurien’s every step of the way yet the man marched on, undeterred, converting his billion-litre idea into a reality called ‘Amul’, the dairy run and owned by farmers, also known as ‘Operation Flood’. The principle underlying the latter lay in creating a national milk grid connecting producers with consumers.

The fact of corporate and cooperative worlds being intrinsically different gets highlighted while describing Dr. Kurien’s experience with the house of Tatas, more specifically his inability to recruit six managers for upgrading baby food factories in Karnataka.

Despite these irritants high accolades poured in for Operation Flood by no less an organisation than the World Bank which, in its report of 1998, praised it for its “unmatchable input-output ratio” highlighting the Rs. 200-crore investment that realised a net return of Rs. 24,000 crore each

By V. Rishi Kesavaram, Faculty, Healthcare Management, TAPMI, Manipal : Email- ([email protected])

year over a period of 10 years. Marketing of ‘Dhara’ by NDDB underscored the importance of building ownership and participative management while incentivising producers to produce more was a win-win strategy for both farmers and consumers. Dr. Kurien’s legacy was upheld with his prestigious appointments of Vice Chancellor of Gujarat Agricultural Union and Chairman of Gujarat Electricity Board (GEC).

Dr. Kurien tried replicating the cooperative model in Pakistan and Sri Lanka with scant success. Allowances for risk-taking must be made to accommodate disappointment. Dr. Kurien’s introspection on refinement in public life compelled him to consider seriously education and literacy. This spurred the birth of Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA), in 1979 with the purpose of producing future leaders of rural management and development. The concept that true democracy emerges only when the people are allowed to manage

has been proved in the creation of cooperatives. The Government can learn from this concept to replicate it for jute, cotton, and food corporations, which may be managed by the producers themselves.

The book carves out the image of Dr. Kurien as one who follows faith as belief without reason in the dictum “For those who believe, no explanation is required; for those who do not, no explanation is possible”. This complete trust is seen in the ‘Anand pattern’ of producing, processing, and marketing... all of which is in the hands of milk producers. It is an illusion to presume that all resources are in the hands of the government.

While the book narrates chronological events in an unorganized way it nevertheless motivates readers to contribute to their mother land. ‘I Too Had a Dream’ is a testimony to Dr. Kurien’s belief in Indian farmers’ success through the cooperatives way, etching a mark in the dairy industry.

“I have witnessed the birth and growth of this unique institution, even since the idea emanated from the fertile brain of your Chairman, Dr V Kurien over 12 years ago”.

“IRMA is playing an important role in generating widespread awareness of the critical role of management in helping the men and women working in the un-organised sector in our villages to derive economic benefit from their toil and skills.”

– Dr M S Swaminathan, Father of Green Revolution, 8th Annual Convocation Address, 1989

• • • •

“It would call for deep commitment and a willingness to stake all, if one is to succeed. The struggle would be daunting, but when the day is won, I am sure you would find that it was well worth it. You are setting out from under the guardianship of one of the finest victors of such a struggle, and I am sure you will find Dr. Kurien’s example a great source of inspiration when the going is tough.”

– Shri Pranab Mukherjee, The Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, 11th Annual Convocation Address, 1992

• • • •

“Now it can be seen as whatever important technological or scientific or industrial event took place in the country we were always 3rd to 5th in the global scale. Whenever I met young, I used to ask them to work for coming out of the 5th country syndrome. When I am with you, today, in Anand, with Dr. V. Kurien and the pioneering team, I am happy that you are breaking fifth country syndrome because India is No-1 in Milk production”.

– Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, Professor, Anna University, 21st Annual Convocation Address, 2002

40 Network

(1985) Mrs. Pupul Jaykar, Secretary, GoI

(1983) Mr. Giani Zail Singh, President of India

(1982) Mrs. Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India

(1984) Mr. Mohammad Hidayatullah, Vice-President of India

IRMA Convocations: Down Memory Lane


(1986) Mr. Rajiv Gandhi, Prime Minister of India

(1989) Mr. MS Swaminathan, Secretary, GoI

(1987) Mr. C. Subramaniam, Secretary, GoI

(1990) Mr. Ramakrishna Hegde, Dy Chairman,

Planning Cimmission, GoI

(1988) Mr. R Venkataraman, Vice-President of India

42 Network

(1992) Mr. Pranab Mukherjee, Dy Chairman, Planning Commission, GoI

(1991) Dr. Manmohan Singh, Secretary, GoI

(1993) Mr. KR Narayanan, Vice President of India

(1994) Mr. IG Patel, Ex-Governor, RBI


(1996) Mr. AM Kushro, Ex-Minister, GoI

(1998) Mr. C Ramachandran, Board Member, IRMA

(1995) Mr. Panduranga Shastri, Social Worker

(1997) Mr. CH Hanumantha Rao, Board Member, IRMA

44 Network

(1999) Mrs. Margaret Catley-Carlson, United Nations

(2000) Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, Prime Minister of India

(2002) Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, Professor, Anna University, Madras

(2001) Ms. Mieko Nishimizu, Vice President - South Asia Region, World Bank


(2003) Mr. Sam Pitroda, Chairman, World-Tel, UK

(2005) Dr. (Mrs.) Syeda Hameed, Member, Planning Commission, GoI

(2006) Dr RA Mashelkar, DG, CSIR & Secretary, GoI

(2004) Mr. LC Jain, Former Member, Planning Commission, GoI

46 Network

Dr K remarked, “Even the full moon has appeared to appreciate our Carillon Chimes” (During the inauguration of Carillon Chimes on Dec 14th, 2002)

Remembering the Legend47 Network SCHEDULE 2

GENERAL PROCEDURE FOR THE CONDUCT OF ELECTION OF 11TH EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF IRMA ALUMNI ASSOCIATION AS LAID DOWN BY THE RETURNING OFFICER

1. Following general procedure has been laid down by the returning officer, keeping in view the principles of natural justice, the constitution and election rules of the association and the Societies Registration Act and Rules. This schedule, therefore, covers a recapitulation of some of the above rules and also lays down rules of practical procedure to harmoniously implement these rules and constitutional provisions.

2. All eligible voters shall have one vote each for the post of President, Vice-President, Secretary and Representative of the respective Zone to which the member belongs as per article 15.0 of the constitution. The address of the voters for limiting their general membership would be decided by the address as available with the association on the date of opening of the postal ballot as laid down in Schedule 1.

3. The nomination for each of the above posts shall be proposed by any ordinary member other than the nominee himself/herself. The nomination letter must contain the following details: (a) Proposer’s name, batch number and complete address and telephone/fax/mobile number, e-mail Id (b) the nominee’s name and batch number and preferably, the complete address, telephone/fax/mobile number, e-mail Id and (c) Post for which nominated.

Provided that no person shall be nominated for more than one post by the same proposer.

Provided further that for the post of zonal representative, the person so nominated and the person proposing shall belong to the zone, for which representation is sought.

4. On the scheduled date, the nominations received by the returning officer will be scrutinized by him. If a person has been nominated for more than one post, the nominee shall have the option to choose his/her nomination for any ONE post, and his/her nomination(s) for all other post(s) shall be considered as invalid.

5. The candidates with valid nominations will have the option to withdraw their nomination. The letter of withdrawal may be typed/written on plain paper and sent to the returning officer so as to reach him on or before the scheduled date and time. Withdrawal of nominations can also be made by fax or e-mail followed by a confirmation by post.

6. The returning officer will publish the voters’ list as per Schedule 1

7. If there are no valid nominations for any post(s), the returning officer will call for fresh nominations and will suitably postpone the schedule of elections for the particular post(s) only. The election schedule in respect to other post(s) shall not be affected by such postponement.

8. Ballot papers will be pre-numbered and mailed to each voter under the signature of the returning officer. The voter will send the completed ballot paper in a sealed envelope to the returning officer, addressed to him by name, so as to reach him by the scheduled date and time, at the institute’s postal address. The ballot papers shall be opened at such place within the campus of the institute as decided by the returning officer. Any member may witness the opening and counting of votes.

9. In case of any dispute or in any residuary matter, not covered by the procedures, the decision of the returning officer will be final. He may also relax/modify any or all of these rules of procedure, and all such relaxations/modifications shall be valid as long as they are not inconsistent with normal prudence, natural justice, the constitution and election rules of the association and the Societies Registration Act, 1860

December 31, 2012 Sd/-Anand Returning Officer (Pratik Modi)

Contd. from page 2

Institute of Rural ManagementPost Box No. 60, Anand – 388 001, Gujarat, India

Phone : (02692) 260177, 260181, 260186, 260391, 260264, 261502Fax : (02692) 260188 • Gram : IRMA

E-mail : [email protected] • Website : http://www.irma.ac.in ANAN

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IRMA Network Magazine dedicated to Dr. V Kurien

Business

Transcript of IRMA Network Magazine dedicated to Dr. V Kurien