What drives India’s top business leaders

Business leaders who have contributed to equitable economic growth and have excelled in building profitable, sustainable and socially conscious businesses were honoured at CNBC-TV18’s India Business Leader Awards 2018 presented by Standard Chartered held on 6 April. Here is what some of the winners have to say about what drives them

Outstanding Business Leader of the Year award: Kumar Mangalam Birla

“In the last 20 years, we have grown 20 times. This year, the group has touched a market capitalisation of $50 billion. We are a trans-generational company with the wisdom and experience of the older generation combined with the fire and aggression of the millennials.” — Kumar Mangalam Birla, Chairman, Aditya Birla Group

The Disruptors: Reliance Jio

“Today we have a financial ecosystem that is second to none but our opportunity across healthcare, education, agriculture is definitely the next big milestone. We are still deprived as a nation from a fixed mobile standpoint. I also heard from the finance ministry today that the data for financial payments is going to be residing in India. The data for Google and Facebook do not have to be outside of India, I think innovation and disruption can happen in India.” — Mathew Oommen, President of Reliance Jio Infocomm

Hall Of Fame award: Late Deshbandhu Gupta, founder of Lupin Limited

“Our late founder used to focus on outcomes, has always led from the front and is a humane person.” — Ramesh Swaminathan, Executive Director, Lupin Limited

CNBC Asia’s Corporate Social Responsibility award: Serum Institute of India

“No government, whether it is this, previous or any future government in India can take on the mammoth task of dealing with our population and so I thought instead of just complaining from the sidelines, I should get involved and see what I can do. With a great team of 350 people, for this initiative, we have accomplished quite a bit. You should see the difference in Pune now.” — Adar Poonawalla, CEO of Serum Institute of India

State of the Year: Chhattisgarh

“We may be the first state in the country to ensure by law that if any person in the age group of 15-45 years seeks training in any skill, we fulfil it in three months. Because of our economic and business policies, Chhattisgarh, which used to be considered a backward state, has become number one.” — Chattisgarh Revenue Minister Prem Prakash Pandey

Entertainment Leader of the Year: Ranveer Singh

“As a proud member of Hindi film fraternity, I want the industry to grow and develop…I want that pool to become bigger. WithBaahubalihaving done the kind of business it has done, it shows the potential…I think there is a long way to go for the film industry but we are definitely on the right track.” — Actor Ranveer Singh

Emerging Disruptor of the Year award: Hector Beverages

“We are very clear that we have to solve the problem of diabetes in India. We will launch some very delicious beverages in a couple of months.”— Neeraj Kakkar, Chief and Co-founder, Hector Beverages

Young Turk of the Year: Zomato

“We want to be the only food app which people should need in any country in the world. That’s our ambition and hopefully a few years down the line we will be there.”— Akshant Goyal, Head-Corporate Development and Investor Relations, Zomato

CNBC Asia’s India Disruptor of the Year: WNSGlobal Services

“This award is for disruptor of the year. Eight years ago when I took over, we had about 15,000 people. I looked at the numbers and I thought it said ‘what, no sales’. Thereafter WNS strategy became ‘work never stops’, ‘we never sleep’, ‘we nurture specialists’ and now it is all about ‘winning never stops’.” — Keshav Murugesh, Group Chief Executive Officer of WNS Global Services

Most Promising Company of the Year award: RBL Bank

“Our company is actually 75 years old but we say that we are 7 years young in our current avatar. In these 7 years, we have grown 30 times and our profits have grown more than 50 times. It is the coming together of a stellar management team which actually said that we will put together the best in class banking institution, deliver best in class banking services but grounded on the principles of strong governance, best professional standards and a very ethical value system.” — Vishwavir Ahuja, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, RBL Bank

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