In this touching piece on TimesNow, he reflects on the legacy built by Shri Shashi Ruia, the life he led, his love for food, and the many qualities that continue to inspire many.
Shashi Ruia would have turned 81 today, December 23. As the patriarch of the Ruia and Essar family, which he became at the ripe old age of 23, after his father’s death, the legacy he created is emotionally rich and heartwarming.
Today Shashi Ruia would have turned 81. Less than a month ago, 28 days to be precise, on the 25th of November 2024 he passed away. Signalling a thumbs down, he told his brother, “Ravi, I am going!”. He met the last challenge decisively, as was his wont.
SNR to his friends and colleagues, led life to the fullest. He kept it simple: confidence in his own ability and faith in the benevolence of Balaji. He believed having been bestowed the privilege and honour of being the means of livelihood to lakhs of people. This belief genuinely humbled him.
As the patriarch of the Ruia and Essar family, which he became at the ripe old age of 23, after his father’s death, the legacy he created is emotionally rich and heartwarming. With seven siblings, six sisters and a brother, he took it upon himself to be the provider. The reality that they were his responsibility, shaped his life, work and values; in effect defined his strong character.
Taking tough decisions was one such trait. Decisions were delivered plainly. He was instinctive, almost intuitive, in his decision making; but not impulsive. He took tough calls impersonally but never unpleasantly. He pulled his brother Ravi out of the engineering college – the most difficult decision of his life, he would often say – to help him fulfil his commitments. They became inseparable as Ravi became a confidante, colleague and partner in building the multi-billion global conglomerate, Essar.
Back then, the command-and-control system worked in favour of the established order of the established big guns. They were the dominant and decisive players. Yet, in about three decades, he was ranked with them in the pantheon of Indian businessmen. He became an iconic entrepreneur who build the Essar group. In the process, he inspired peers and heirs not only in realm of business but life itself.
A “colossus of Indian business”, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi called him, he brought new energy and ambition to Indian Inc when he started off as a first-generation entrepreneur in 1969 in Madras, now Chennai. It was in these early days of growing up that the sharp business instincts of a Marwari got blended with the values of the conservative south Indian society.
Never larger than life, he exuded a justified pride in his abilities and accomplishments. He proved his mettle by facing and overcoming the challenges of life: business and personal. Shashi Ruia knew the corporate ocean like the back of his hand. He could be trusted to navigate in the choppiest of corporate seas in the worst of storms. He would bring you back to the shore, nice and dry. If you got to know him, you realise his self-belief helped him preserve a sense of hope and outcome positivity regardless of circumstance.
Every time one met him, you would come out lighter and less burdened no matter what the situation. All that he would have done in the meeting was to recount an interesting anecdote with a life’s learning embedded. He would have shared an experience which was laced with wisdom. And of course, he would lighten up the mood with a joke or two, often on modern management practices.
Besides building businesses, he built bonds of relationships, not with just the high and mighty but everyone who he met on his journey. For each a unique bond was built and shared. With some it was a very paternal bond, some others it was the old boy’s network and often times just the good old Chennai connection. No one knew how to bond better. He would let the situation mould his behaviour. With youngsters, he would be the curious kind, wanting to know about their new and exciting world. When on site, he was a hard nailed operations man on back slapping terms with the project staff and workers.
Not for him is the ethereal qualities of the oakwood lined boardrooms. Any day, without batting an eyelid, he would trade it for the sights on site: the smell of crude, the dust and debris of cement and concrete, the shine of the steel, the bellows of smoke, and the rust and the soot. That is where he felt home at. And picked up his own management mantras. These would be passed on creatively, often in the form of parables.
A man with ordinary capabilities, but a human being with extraordinary qualities. He was so rooted to the ground that if you were to tell him a problem, he would hear a solution. If you shared a constraint, he would be listening to an opportunity! In the lexicon of millennials, he was wired differently.
Right till the end, he held the conviction that it is a different world; a new world that is vastly different from the time he stood on the site in the sun to build a steel plant here and an oil refinery there. Today, he believed, business has to be done differently. To put is starkly, was he to start business today, as he did in 1969, he would do it very differently. When an achiever has the maturity to say this, it shows his sagacity and pragmatism.
If there is one thing that everyone should emulate from Shashi Ruia it is the way he valued the past, was content with the present and assured about the future. He fundamentally believed that “If we cannot change the world, let’s at least change our lives”. And he had the satisfaction of having changed quite a few a few of those.
His life was about family, friends and food; outside of business, that is. He relished food. And like all gourmands he enjoyed it in the company of his family and foodie friends. Food spoke to his senses, and it brought him closer to people. When I met him, just a few days before he passed away, we were planning a nice Afghan meal at home!
But nothing beats his flying 16 hours from Dallas to Dubai, not in the pink of health, heading straight from the airport to a very basic eatery. Enroute to the place which he had googled, he called his children, and an impromptu family dinner out happens. Such seemingly small pleasures reflected his zest for life the way.
Tributes have poured on from all over, but the one that would have brought a smile to his face is the one by his “four am” friend and son, Anshuman: the Rhythm of the Pride Lands soundtrack, which evocatively expresses a sentiment widely shared about him, yet deeply personal:
In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight.
Near the village, the peaceful village, the lion sleeps tonight
He lives in you, He lives in me
He watches over, everything we see.
– Dr Haseeb A. Drabu
Source: timesnownews.com
User