My mother would slog endlessly at the farm for 10-12 hours every day, cutting costs by doing everything herself and making my brothers and me do our share because she did not want us getting fancy ideas about ourselves

From studying the complexities of the human mind, she moved to mulling over fowl matters and is now sitting pretty on the many eggs in her basket. Anuradha Desai, chairperson, Venkateshwara Hatcheries, was unfazed by the recent global panic about avian flu. A great lover of the ubiquitous chicken curry herself, the diminutive boss speaks about stepping into her father's shoes in a freewheeling conversation with Simrin Makhija

Her life and work revolve around these feathered friends, yet there was a time when she wanted nothing to do with them. Her calling was psychology, she had decided. But if your father is Dr B. V. Rao, regarded as the pioneer of the poultry business in India, then naturally chicken and egg take precedence over everything else.

From studying the complexities of the human mind to mulling over chick problems, does the 42-year-old, now heading the Rs 1,300-crore group, regret giving in to her father's pressure and joining the family business in 1984? “Initially, I did try to convince him that I was not interested, but he insisted that my two brothers and I visit the farm regularly and familiarise ourselves with the business. And now that I am neck deep in it, I know this is the best thing to have happened to me.”

It has taken years to do it, but Desai feels that she has finally measured up to the trust that her father invested in her when he groomed her to be his successor all those years ago. “Today, we are the second largest producer of eggs in the world,” she says, “and also the cheapest producer of this storehouse of nutrition. Contrast this with the fact that we also have a huge problem of malnutrition in the country. I am constantly striving to find out new ways to leverage our strength in poultry to provide nutrition to as many as possible.”

She rewinds to her childhood which she spent on a chicken farm at Khadakvasala on the outskirts of Pune. Her father then was just another small poultry farmer, the only difference being that he was forever innovating to make the small scale business more viable. “It was my mother, Uttara,” Desai asserts, “who turned him into an astute businessman. She would slog endlessly at the farm for 10-12 hours every day, cutting costs by doing everything herself and also making us do our share because she did not want us getting fancy ideas about ourselves. And it was she who pushed him into business when all he wanted was to work for somebody else.”

Business for the group took off in a major way as did her father's status - Dr Rao is known as the person who gave India's poultry business a status of its own in the global scenario. In 1996, when Asian countries were not even a blip on the world poultry map, he worked tirelessly on the international platform and got the World Poultry Congress (WPC) to hold its session in India. Unfortunately, he passed away just months before the event.

This tragedy catapulted his daughter into becoming President of the WPC. Industry watchers say that this was the turning point in her career. “Face to face with international experts, I suddenly realised what a huge potential India had in this field. All that was needed was a little will power and an awful lot of commitment.”

Obviously, these words were not lacking in Desai's vocabulary and today, Venkateshwara Hatcheries is the undisputed leader, a vibrant entity, changing and evolving with the times. “Father constantly told us that complacency is the worst thing to happen to anyone and that only companies who constantly innovate and remain proactive to the needs of the market can retain their leadership position. He also said that research and development give you the winning edge and how right he was,”she recalls.

The challenges facing her are many. “For instance, how do we reach the number one position on the global poultry map, how to ensure that the benefits of the quantum growth in this business reach the smallest farmer…” muses the dusky, soft-spoken woman who is known to speak her mind, especially on issues close to her heart, like the future of the Indian poultry industry.

Talking straight and to the point has been her style at work and this trait helped her immensely when she put in a four-year-long gruelling stint as the President of the World Poultry Congress, where her role included addressing meetings of the top players in the industry at high-profile overseas events.

Yet, walk into the group's corporate offices in Pune and it is easy to miss the chairperson who admits that she is most comfortable in casual, unfussy clothes. “I put on a lot of weight after my daughter was born and have not really found time to knock it off,” she confesses. You are also likely to miss her, because she prefers to move around the workplace, interacting with the staff and getting clued in on the atmosphere at work. “Every time you spend a few minutes to listen to somebody who has a problem, you have earned yourself a relationship for life because that person is bound to go back with the conviction that somebody cares about him/her and will do their best for you every time.”

Not for Anuradha Desai, the trappings of power, including the tendency to order people around. Instead, having worked her way up every ladder in the organisation, she is a great believer in delegation. “Give people the freedom to function, take initiative and decisions and they will outperform themselves and develop a sense of belonging for the organisation,” she says with confidence.

She is also a great one for relationship building and empathising with the staff. “I don't have a leadership style that can be classified, but I do know that you can earn the loyalty and respect of those around you if you know your work and your goals. My stand is clear. There is work to do and everyone has to do it including me. You cannot force the best out of everyone; but every time you convince someone you are doing your best, they will put in their best for you,” she says.

Though ably helped by her two brothers, Venky and Balaji, as the group's chairperson, Desai has to walk the tightrope between meeting the demands of work and her family. She has tried to solve this problem by working out of home the better part of the day, so that she can attend to her eleven-year-old school going daughter, Uttara, named after her mother.

Home is the sprawling farmhouse Dr Rao built high up in the hills on the outskirts of Pune, next to the imposing National Defence Academy. While husband, Jitendra Desai, is away at work handling the group's finances, she is at work at home, constantly discussing, strategising and holding sales meetings, simultaneously ensuring that her daughter is not neglected.

“It is not easy - bringing up a child and working - but I have decided to give both my best shot and simply hope for the best. When Uttara was younger, she accompanied me on my tours but now her school schedule is more demanding and she prefers to stay at home. This has made her a very independent child.” Bonding time for the Desai family is their annual vacation, usually in Switzerland which they love. Besides long walks, a trip to Mt Titlis is a must. “And I know I should not, but I indulge in lots of chocolates,” she grins.

Her large farmhouse home is in the lap of nature and she says she loves walking in the gardens when she is trying to reach a business decision, even though occasionally disturbed by the rather shrill and luridly colourful African parakeet that sits proudly in its cage, at the entrance to the residence.

The residence is a study in simplicity, bursting with memorabilia of her parents and their achievements in the poultry industry. It is here also that she keeps in touch with the most vital element in their business. Chicken and eggs are a regular part of the family diet and Desai says every item that the company puts into the market in the ready-to-eat segment is first tasted by the family before it hits the retail shelves. “What's not good enough for my family can't be good for anybody else.” Desai herself is a great lover of chicken curry and says her daughter has grown up on a staple diet of all the company's products. “I have finally realised one home truth about the Indian consumer - no frozen food is as good as the fresh food he has access to. That's why for us, future growth has to come from further processed products like chicken nuggets, ready-to-eat meals and other value added products like salami and sausages.”

She continues, “The customer has a deep-rooted suspicion of anything that might not be safe in a country where frequent power cuts are a menace to safe cold storage. Our blast frozen chicken business has grown only because we finally have a proper cold chain in place which safely takes the product across the country into the remotest village. Even then, it is the further processed chicken business that is booming both on the retail side and also for customers like Domino's and Pizza Hut for whom we customise products.”

Desai's group is involved in every aspect of the poultry business including research, production of poultry vaccine and egg powder, nutrition products for the birds, production of poultry equipment and is credited with setting up a nationwide network of hatcheries. The company forayed into the pet food business a short while ago, importing and selling a range of nutritious pet foods under the Royal Pet brand.

Plans are now being firmed to go in for manufacture of pet foods in India for which a plant is coming up near Pune. “We have the best ingredients and raw materials within the group and producing in India will make the products significantly cheaper,” feels Desai. Also on the anvil is a project to manufacture vitamin and mineral pre-mix for poultry and large animals which will also go on stream soon. “The poultry business contributes Rs. 29,000 crores to the GNP and it is time we get our rightful place on the industrial map of the country,” she concludes forcefully.