“I weep when I cruise past my village in my BMW. My chauffeur thinks I’m crazy when I ask him to stop the car by a huge tree. I get out and rest in its shade. I give it a hug and even talk to it.”
—Ashok Khade, chairman, Das Offshore Pvt Ltd, Mumbai
The tree Khade stops by falls on the way to his village Ped in Sangli district in Maharashtra, and is the very place where his father made a living as a cobbler. Young Khade’s caste marked him out for exclusion—from the village ground, the well, its water, the temple—almost everything. Education held the lone hope in this dark abyss, and Khade clutched firmly at this straw, sweating it out at the Mazgaon docks during the day and studying for a diploma in mechanical engineering at night. It wasn’t easy; there were times when he had to live under staircases because he could not afford to pay the rent. But determination and hard work eventually paid off. Today, Khade presides over a business empire that is worth Rs 550 crore and has a workforce of 4,500 people. Das Offshore undertakes construction assignments for offshore rigs, and also builds skywalks or foot overbridges.
Khade and 30 other businesspersons, including a woman, are now part of a league of ‘Dalit crorepatis’, comprising first-generation entrepreneurs who run successful businesses and give jobs to others. And they haven’t used the ladder of quotas to get to the top, preferring instead to strike out on their own, cocking a snook at the cynics who disapprovingly cluck at the very mention of an inclusive society based on positive discrimination. Propelled by sheer grittiness and tremendous self-belief, they have arrived at a juncture far removed from their predecessors and have acquired a clout their forefathers wouldn’t even have dreamt of. So much so that the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) is trying to formalise an association with their body, the Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DICCI).
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