Refinery | wealthymatters

Dhirubhai Ambani

February 5, 2011 5 Comments

There is no official biography of Dhirubhai Ambani.In its absence a book like ‘ The Polyester Prince ” has to suffice.That Hamish McDonald was not close to Dhirubhai Ambani is a fact.That is why I kept this article – for the contrast.Here Mukesh Ambani speaks about his father to Pritish Nandy.Enjoy this read!

What were your father’s childhood years like? Does he ever speak to you about them?

Very frequently, in fact. Stories about his childhood have always inspired us, taught us how to cope with life’s vicissitudes.

Papa was always very responsible and enterprising. When he was in school, he went to the foot of Mount Girnar — the famous mountain in Saurashtra, where he grew up in a small town called Chorwad in Junagadh — and opened his own shop. To sell bhajias to pilgrims over the weekend. This is how he earned his own money though his needs were few. Until he left for Aden, he wore only half pants!

Why did he go to Aden? Yemen is not exactly an El Dorado.

He was fond of adventure. I guess Aden provided him an opportunity to experience it. To escape his own background, to see the world. He actually went with a recommendation for a job, like people go to Dubai these days. He had just completed school. SSC at that time. Even that on his second attempt! It was like MABF. Matric Appeared But Failed.

Luckily for him, he had admirers at that young age. One of them liked his spirit of enterprise so much that he sent him off to Aden for a job with an Indian trading company. A pedhi. A pedhi was like a proprietary firm. He started there and then moved on to a job with Shell.

What kind of job?

It began at the petrol pump. Then he went on to logistics. Loading all the ships and airplanes, making sure that the entire fuel logistics for Shell worked in perfect synchronicity. Read more of this post

Filed under Tidbits Tagged with Dhirubhai Ambani, Mukesh Ambani, Oil and Gas, Petrochemicals, Plastics, Polyester, Pritish Nandy, Refinery, Reliance, Telcom

The Dirty Truth About Indian Gold

January 21, 2011 7 Comments

Here is an article that appeared in the TOI in Jan ’09.If you invest in Indian gold jewellery,this article might just persuade you to have a fire assay done on your hoard to determine its fineness.

ALL THAT GLITTERS IS NOT GOLD

Your wedding jewellery may not be as pure or as precious as you think it is. Several goldsmiths across India have taken to adulterating the precious metal with iridium and ruthenium,and are getting away with it, as until recently the metals failed to show up on all purity checks. It’s an alchemist’s dream, and the practice is becoming increasingly commonplace if you go by the stocks of the ‘duplicate’ metals at even the smallest of karigar workshops.

Both iridium and ruthenium belong to the platinum family of metals, and when mixed with gold, do not form an alloy but sit tight in the yellow metal.

What makes the adulteration even more alarming is that the metals do not replace silver and copper, which are added to the gold during the jewellery-making process to harden the soft, malleable yellow metal. As Saumen Bhaumik, general manager (Retailing) at Tanishq put it, “The two metals manage to camouflage as gold.’’

TOI tested several pieces of jewellery, and all had some amount of either iridium or ruthenium lurking inconspicuously with the gold. A 22-carat gold bangle bought in 2003 from a century-and-a-half-old jeweller—who has since then expanded from Mumbai to other parts of the country—when tested at the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay, had 3% iridium in it.

A gold chain bought from a shop in Bangalore in 2002 when tested at another citybased centre had 2.39% ruthenium, while a pair of earrings from Kerala was found to be adulterated with 4.65% of iridium.

On an average, a piece of jewellery or a bar of gold contains nearly 5-6% of the adulterant, and manufacturers—wholesalers and retailers across India—are aware of how rampant this notorious practice is. Consumers, however, are the biggest losers as they have been kept in the dark. Read more of this post