A Story... How a poor cleaning boy became the founder of US$800 million company

Image by Alagu. via Flickr

It’s hard to believe that a 12-year-old who began work as a cleaning boy in a small shop in Karachi, who later worked as door to door peddler of electrical supplies, can build one of India's leading business conglomerates.


This is not a fairy tale story. This is a story of a real person with strong willpower who can always find a way to overcome the obstacles in his path to success. This month, we would like to introduce you to Prahlad P. Chhabria, a self made man. He is the founder of Finolex Group — India’s leading cable maker and the second largest PVC resin manufacturer, with a turnover that exceeds US$800 million.

His father’s untimely death made his family poor. To help his widowed mother and nine siblings, Prahlad P. Chhabria started working from a young age and his formal education ended at the 2nd Grade.

At the age of 12, he started his career as a cleaner in a small cloth shop at a salary of Rs10 per month. At 13, he served sherbet to customers in a cloth store. A year later, he worked as a bill collector in Amritsar. While keeping accounts, he taught himself to read and write.

Later, Chhabria and his younger brother and business partner Kishan moved to Pune and learned their Engineering basics. In between jobs, they began selling electrical supplies all over Pune, soon opening a retail shop. The differentiator was their ability to provide electrical services. By taking appliances apart, Kishan learnt to repair them, moving on to laying electrical cables, even making his own line of irons.

It was this knowledge of fabrication that propelled them into the next league, and they began to supply to the army. While Kishan became an expert on manufacturing processes, Chhabria became well-versed in applying for licenses in Delhi.

On his 78th birthday last March, he released his autobiography, There’s No Such Thing As a Self-Made Man. This is an inspiring and motivational book for all of us to read as it shows how hard works and integrity brings about success.

We would like to conclude his story with one of his famous quotes:

"Poverty, luck and lack of contacts are merely constraints people carry in their minds. If you start with a positive attitude, half the job is done."