I Too Had a Dream

by Verghese Kurien

If you are always honest to yourself, it does not take much effort in always being honest with others.

if we are brave enough to love, strong enough to rejoice in another’s happiness and wise enough to know that there is enough to go around for all, then we would have lived our lives to the fullest.

I saw that when you work merely for your own profit, the pleasure is transitory; but if you work for others, there is a deeper sense of fulfilment and if things are handled well, the money, too, is more than adequate.

I began to see then that when the government enters business, the citizens of India get cheated. The greatest repercussion of the government entering into business is that instead of safeguarding people from vested interests, they themselves become the vested interest.

I was to learn yet another valuable but sad lesson: that the technical advice of ‘experts’ is all too often dictated by the economic interests of the advanced countries and not by the needs or ground realities in developing countries.

bureaucracy,

which was designed by the British to rule, not to serve.

In every crisis, if you look carefully, you will spot an opportunity. My insistence on finding and seizing that opportunity has often been a source of annoyance for many of my colleagues because it means that unlike most people, I never try to sidestep a crisis. Rather, the more monstrous the crisis, the more I am tempted to rush at it, grasp it by the horns and manoeuvre it until it gives me what I want!

The first of the principles was that if we wanted to produce milk, we must have a market for it and that market must be such that the person producing the commodity must profit.

Manthan,

I have always believed that once you identify the best person for a particular project and tell him or her exactly what you expect, you must put your complete trust in that person, allowing him or her to work independently without interference. If you do, the project is bound to succeed.

The tragedy of India is that we frequently have no respect for Indians, for Indian efforts and for Indian successes.

Basic social and economic change needs to be brought about gradually and the more carefully and thoughtfully it is effected, the more permanent it will be.

‘When you stand above the crowd, you must be ready to have stones thrown at you.’