Pratap Bhogilal Journey Through Life

Author(s): Rauf Ahmed
Publisher: Bhupendra Singh Anand

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PRATAP BHOGILAL - JOURNEY THROUGH LIFE
machine tool manufacturing company called Quickmill Inc. and a French company AESA, which is a successor company of Ameliorair.
Directorship of Bank of India
I was a member of the Advisory Committee of Bank of Baroda (BOB) in 1960. At that time the Bank had just one such committee and it was based in Mumbai. Mr.Tulsidas Kilachand was the Chairman of the Bank and Mr. N. M. Choksi the Managing Director. One day I got a call from the Chairman of Bank of India (BOI), Mr. A.D.Shroff, and I went to see him because of my respect for him. He was a Director on the Board of many Tata companies. He said he would like me to be a Director on the Board of Bank of India. I told him I knew nothing about banking. He said, "It does not matter, since you have good common sense you can learn." He added that I would find the experience useful. I consulted Bapaji. He said I should accept the offer.I became a Director on the Board of Bank of India in 1961 and I resigned from the committee of Bank of Baroda.
The Chairman of Bank of Baroda, Mr. Tulsidas Kilachand, was unhappy with my decision to be a Director on the Board of Bank of India. But I felt that I would be much more effective in the position of a Director on the Board of Bol than as a member of an Advisory Committee.Later, the General Manager of BOB, Mr.Choksey, met me and said, "I am very sorry that you have joined BOI. In fact, I had proposed to the Chairman that he should invite you to be a Director on the Board of BOB, but the chairman did not agree." In any case, we all had to resign from the boards of banks in 1968 when all banks were nationalized by Morarji Desai, who was Finance Minister in Mrs. Indira Gandhi's cabinet. But I must admit that my experience and the exposure to the banking sector proved to be of immense value to me in the future.
When I joined BOI as a Director, Shantibhai Kothari was the bank's Chief Manager in London. I happened to meet him and his wife Taraben at the inauguration of a new branch of the bank in Manchester in 1962, and we became good friends. Taraben was later honoured by the Queen of England with the title of 'Dame' (a female equivalent of Knight) for her work among Indian immigrants from Africa, who had to leave in great
Despair devours man - Mahatma Gandhi