Swinging the carved mahogany doors open, Dipali Goenka walks in. With power shoulders, a supermodel waist and a chin that’s a fashion photographer’s dream, she looks like she has just stepped out of an Armani commercial. I’m having an audience with the Indian queen of organic cotton. After ordering cups of her favourite masala tea for us, she is ready to talk about her passion.

“The farmland has to lie untouched for three years before we start planting organic cotton in it. By international regu-lations, the land has to be completely stripped of pesticides,” says Dipali Goenka, director, Welspun Retail. In a world of Twitter-like attention spans, Goenka’s mission sounds like a Herculean effort. She is reinventing the Indian cotton heritage. No cottage industry this. Her textile empire is estimated at 2000 crore rupees with retail at 115 crores. She and her husband own home stores Welhome and Spaces in India, Christy in United Kingdom and Sorema in Portugal. They are licensed to sell foreign brands Nautica Home and Waverly. Her organic cotton linen is exported to upscale brands like Ralph Lauren and stores like Bloomingdale’s.

I am sitting in her home office in Mahalaxmi, Mumbai. An expansive heritage building overlooking the Arabian Sea, the house has been restored lovingly by Goenka to a Versailles-meets-England-country-side look. “We’re a traditional linen company. Knowing our margins would always be low, we decided to play the innovation game,” she elaborates in a polished, clipped tone. Studying trends in the West over the last decade, she realised that organic cotton was the next big market mover. With organic cotton growing in Bhuj and with the help of specialised factories, her company started exporting to foreign luxury brands like Ralph Lauren. That’s the best it gets, doesn’t it? “Yes, our reputation helps. Back in the days when we wanted to export ordinary towels, we took a set to Walmart. They thought we had stamped and brought in a foreign brand. Today our factories are their benchmark for organic purposes.” Her tone brims with confidence. From the initial disbelief she evoked at Walmart to becoming the sole organic queen at Ralph Lauren, Goenka has certainly moved up the chain. “We have used the recession for expansion, a lot of companies in the West have filed for bankruptcy. We are buying their assets and will make them stores under our organisation.”

The Indian mid-market Welhome brand is gaining market share in India. With 200 stores and 50 multi-brand outlets in 120 cities, it is solidly entrenched in middle-class India. Trendy Spaces, her brand for upmarket clientele is also expanding rapidly. What are her organic prospects in India? “The Indian consumer is rapidly evolving. Earlier, a set of sheets and a couple of towels were the norm in a regular Indian household. Thread counts were unheard of.”

Goenka finished a three-year Owner President Manage-ment Programme at Harvard Business School in 2008 and she returned to an India full of promise. A formidable education from the most reputed B-school and a company that was already on the threshold of major success was all she needed to hitch her star to. Wearing a black wrap dress with killer heels and dazzling solitaires, she looks every bit ready to take on the Forbes Power List.

Besides organic cotton, Welspun uses a number of eco-friendly natural fibres like bamboo, eucalyptus, soya, milk, honey and sea-weed in their products. Her mantra: experiment, experiment, experiment. In addition to this, “we have our own organic brand – Amy Butler Designs. Amy’s fabrics are 100 per cent organic, the dyes are all certified eco-friendly and devoid of toxic chemicals. Even the fitted sheets have drawstrings in order to avoid plastic.” The 40-year-old is quick to admit that unless a holistic farm-to-shelf approach is taken towards organic cotton, the intrinsic message is lost. “We are looking to grow our own cotton, fully develop our factory townships and sell from our own retail shelves.” Their factories are developed in Anjar, Vapi and Sil-vassa in Gujarat. Her gazelle-like eyes light up when she speaks of these towns and the people who work for her company. She has seen them go from mere villages in the dust bowl of Gujarat to planned townships.

Goenka married at 18 and has two daughters: the older one in Wellesley College, USA, and the younger one in a tony international baccalaureate school in suburban Mumbai. She started working for Welspun when the girls were in middle school. It wasn’t easy. She was ‘the promoter’s wife.’ The staff made sure that her office was clean and her refreshments ready. After all ‘Madam was coming, she will stay for a little while and then go back home.’ But Goenka used this time to read as much as she could on the industry and gain enough marketing experience. Years later, she was ready to head the Welhome brand which was to follow with Spaces.

Goenka requests for some classical music to be played as she readies for the shoot. She is a trained kathak dancer of the Jaipur gharana and has been practising since high school. “Are you coming to watch the Bollywood burlesque queen at the YPO event?” she asks me. “Pop psychology is very interesting, don’t you think so? Especially in the burlesque form?” she laughs. Indeed, Goenka understands pop psychology very well. That’s amply evident in the empire she has built.

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