Chief Executive Officer / India
The decisions that required owners and managers to agree
- Company employees
- 270
- March 2026; six executive direct reports
- Company revenue
- ₹116 crore
- FY 2025–26; ₹8.9 crore operating profit
- Manufacturing experience
- 32 years
- Production planning to CEO and executive statutory director
Decisions & consequences
01Reconciling the delivery dates our own leadership had made inconsistent
A 2022 review of thirty-eight orders found nine with conflicting delivery expectations. Customers had received dates through senior commercial or shareholder relationships that did not match the operating schedule. I had tolerated those interventions as COO and continued to accept them early in my CEO tenure. The factory was then expected to recover the difference through expediting, even when the requested priority displaced another customer commitment.
The commercial head proposed leaving the informal route available for important accounts and asking operations to confirm it afterwards. I considered that insufficient because the customer would already have heard a promise. I asked the executive team to reconcile all thirty-eight orders and define a single approval route for future exceptions. The review had to state the requested date, the operating basis and the effect on other work. Engineering and quality retained release authority; an approved commercial exception could not substitute for technical acceptance.
The ten-week correction cost ₹66 lakh in expediting, planning support and customer resolution. Thirty orders retained their original dates and eight had revised dates agreed with customers. These were reconciled commitments, not a claim that every order had already been delivered on time. I reported the changed dates and expense to Uma Selvqani rather than describing the exercise as a costless process improvement. One family representative objected that the new route reduced the responsiveness on which the business had been built.
The chair supported the same approval route for owner-originated requests. We preserved the ability to escalate an important customer issue, but the escalation now produced an explicit decision instead of a second date circulating outside the plan. I accepted that my earlier willingness to intervene had contributed to the ambiguity.
The outcome was a clearer account of who could commit the company and what an exception would displace. We did not remove commercial judgement from the process. We made its consequences visible before the customer relied on them. I learned that a professional CEO cannot ask managers to respect delegated authority while treating an informal instruction from above as exempt from the same discipline.
Entering one region with support funded instead of three with support assumed
In 2024 the commercial team proposed a three-region expansion with a ₹12 crore annual sales forecast for modular workshop equipment. The presentation focused on distributor reach and shipment opportunity. Review with service and finance identified ₹1.7 crore of initial service-parts stock and ₹32 lakh recurring annual support expense needed for the proposed coverage. Those resources were not included in the original commercial account. They described continuing obligations after delivery, not optional features that could be added if the forecast succeeded.
The sales leader proposed launching all three regions and building support from early receipts. That approach would make the first customers carry an operating uncertainty they had not agreed to. I asked for a narrower option with defined coverage, stock ownership and responsibilities for technical escalation. We selected one region with ₹68 lakh initial parts stock and ₹14 lakh recurring annual support expense. Those figures were not presented as a direct subtraction from the three-region costs because the scope and operating arrangement differed.
The choice postponed the larger forecast and required a revised discussion with prospective distributors. We did not call the ₹12 crore an order book or report the deferred forecast as lost contracted revenue. I took the recommendation to the board with the working-capital and expense requirements separated. CFO Rohan Pelqathi reviewed the financial implications, while technical and service teams defined the capabilities needed to support the agreed offer. No product rating or suitability claim was created through the commercial decision.
The one-region programme began with the support allocation approved. Wider entry remained conditional on operating evidence and another investment decision. We did not claim that the initial launch had already achieved the forecast or that every future service request would be resolved within a universal time.
This case changed the expansion conversation from how far we could sell to what the company would remain responsible for after selling. A distributor can provide market access without assuming all of the manufacturer's obligations. My job was to choose and fund a coherent offer before customers, partners and our own team had to discover the missing responsibilities through a problem.
Reducing a proposed distribution after reconciling the cash already spoken for
A 2025 shareholder discussion proposed a ₹5 crore dividend after reviewing a bank balance of ₹8.1 crore. The amount looked comfortable beside the distribution in isolation. The CFO's account for the defined four-week period included ₹3.2 crore supplier payments, ₹1.9 crore payroll and ₹0.8 crore tax payments. Those listed commitments totalled ₹5.9 crore, leaving ₹2.2 crore before any distribution. The review did not assume uncertain customer receipts would arrive in time to fill the difference.
Some owners preferred to retain the ₹5 crore proposal and use additional borrowing if needed. I asked finance to compare the funding implication openly rather than treat the bank balance as evidence that the distribution financed itself. Borrowing could be a separate option for the board to assess, but it did not change which commitments already existed. I recommended a smaller proposal while the company retained capacity to meet those payments and respond to uncertainty.
The board approved a ₹1 crore distribution after the required financial and professional review. In the stated cash scenario, that left ₹1.2 crore after the listed payments and distribution. The calculation did not establish a general legal test or imply that cash alone determined what could be paid. Rohan Pelqathi retained responsibility for the financial work, and the decision went through the company's appropriate approval process. I was accountable for explaining the enterprise consequence to shareholders rather than leaving the CFO to resist the request alone.
The reduced distribution disappointed owners who had planned around the larger figure. I acknowledged that consequence without treating their expectation as an obligation superior to the company's existing commitments. We also agreed that future proposals would include the timing of material cash needs and the uncertainty of receipts alongside the requested amount.
The outcome was a smaller approved distribution and a clearer decision account, not a claim that all liquidity risk had disappeared. Actual cash still needed monitoring. I learned that the CEO's role in a difficult financial conversation is to support an intelligible enterprise choice, including when the answer constrains the people who own the business.