The Rs 4,000-crore township that farmers built

How did you go about putting your idea into action?

Pune was already famous for its automobile industry. We had good educational institutions and therefore I decided on a knowledge city. I did not go for heavy industry because we were within city limits and I did not want to pollute the place. I wanted the residential complex next to the workplace and this is not possible with heavy industries.

IT was a nascent industry. Whatever is new is always easy to sell. First I had to get the 120 families together. Down the generations, family land had become fragmented due to divisions. We had to come together to succeed. I told them that we could uplift ourselves. Everyone would get a share depending on the size of their land. Instead of becoming land sellers let us become developers, I said. Earlier as farmers we had co-operated to get water when we needed it.

They trusted me. They were all Magars like me. I promised them that I would not sell or mortgage the land to borrow money till the project started. So if the project failed to take off we would still own the land. We would lose nothing. We approached the government with our plan. At that time Sharad Pawar was the Maharashtra chief minister and he was very encouraging. He told us to do it properly and not to take short cuts. The entire process took six years. We have dealt with four chief ministers. Construction started in 2000.

Were there any teething problems?

From paper to actual work was a big change. Practical problems came up. Pune has the National Institute of Construction. We sent our youth to study there. We did not call in any builder. We made our people contractors. We decided to have our own quarries. The sand was supplied by contractors, who were our farmers. The second generation had to become entrepreneurs.

I convinced the families that to succeed they all had to work. We made our own bricks. Except steel, cement and the high-quality glass, everything else was ours. We also developed a separate corporate identity. The face that the people would see was a corporate entity.

I made it very clear that the farmers would be shareholders in the co-operative. They would be contractors. But they would not interfere with the company. They would not have any say in the running of the business. Those who came here to buy houses or rent office space would meet company professionals and not farmers.

I also made it clear that as vendors of the company they could be fired if they did not follow the rules. After we completed the first building -- Daffodils -- it was difficult to find buyers. Nobody wanted to buy houses here. We decided to develop the infrastructure so that people who come here would find it attractive. We laid the main road and started work on the gardens. We started aggressive marketing. We co-branded with HDFC, which was a big boost.

Our sales pitch used to be passionate. All you had to do is make one call showing interest. Our sales team used to go meet them. I used to personally talk to the customer. The central garden, we prepared first. We wanted customers to see it first. We came out with many one liners like 'buy a house, get a city free.' Our people worked very hard.

We came out with good brochures. We held a job fair for the IT park in 2000. This brought us a lot of attention. In 2003 we started the first IT park. From then on there has been no stopping us.