She’s built two non-government organisations (NGOs) from scratch. She’s written a medical thriller — although it didn’t quite hit the best-seller list. And now, Rohini Nilekani, wife of Infosys co-chairman Nandan Nilekani, is set to anchor an issue-based television show.

But the budding anchor doesn’t divulge any details about her upcoming TV show. “It’s too early to talk about the show. It’s in a very nascent stage,” she says. The show details might be top secret, but Nilekani is more forthcoming about her personal reasons for opting to anchor it. She says it’s part of her coming-out process — an emphatic gesture that will prove, if proof were needed, that she’s not just another fat cat corporate wife.

It will also allow her to renew her career in the media. Nilekani was a journalist with Bombay Magazine before she married a young IITian who would go on to create one of India’s cult software firms. But journalism took a backseat once corporate stardom — and big money — was thrust upon the Nilekanis. But Nilekani clearly hasn’t forgotten her journalism. When requested to give an urgent interview, she replied, “Why, has some other story fallen through? I know that happens often.”

Nilekani finally couldn’t take time out for an interview at short notice. She had meetings, an inauguration and a weekend trip to Kannur, a seaside Kerala town, lined up. But she promises to meet as soon as she returns from her short holiday. And she does.

The double-storey Nilekani home — in Bangalore’s posh Koramangala colony — looks straight out of a designer homes magazine. The entire ground floor of the well-lit, stone-façade house is a sprawling living room which looks onto a perfectly manicured lawn. Every knick knack — from the showpieces, coffee table books, the abstract wall paintings to the indoor flower beds and brass-and-teak swing — add élan to the house.

But life in the lap of luxury is nothing out of the ordinary for Nilekani. “I lead a perfectly normal life. It will make a boring read,” she says as she sits back on a rich brown, leather-upholstered sofa. The mistress of the house is well turned out in a pink salwar-kurta and a hint of morning make-up.

Normal, clearly, is a subjective word. For Nilekani is not just the wife of one of India’s biggest billionaires; she is phenomenally wealthy herself, thanks to the 1.67 per cent of Infosys that she owns. Her personal fortune has reportedly soared to about $ 300 million along with the meteoric rise of the company’s stock.

When Infosys became a success story — and catapulted its seven founders to stardom — Nilekani didn’t know how to react to the new-found fame. “I didn’t handle the company’s success well. At first, I reacted with incredulity,” she says. Then, she went clambering for cover. “I stayed completely out of the public eye,” she adds.

The mother-of-two kept her children away from the limelight as well. “They went to Krishnamurthy Foundation School, where snobbery of any sort is discouraged. It helped them remain grounded,” says Nilekani.

In retrospect, Nilekani feels she mismanaged Infosys’ success because she didn’t see it coming. “When Infosys started, none of us imagined it would reach so far. The company started from nothing and had no political or family business backing,” she recalls.

Nilekani was a 21-year-old newly-wed when Infosys was launched. The daughter of a retired chief engineer, she had just graduated from Mumbai’s Elphinstone College — where she had studied French literature and met IITian Nandan Nilekani at an inter-college quiz competition — and taken up a journalist’s job at Bombay Magazine.

Why journalism? “When you can’t do anything, you either become a journalist or a politician,” laughs Nilekani.

Nandan had joined Patni Computers, where his boss was a short-built, serious-minded senior, N.R. Narayana Murthy, who at that time was planning to start his own software venture. He asked Nandan to join him. “I was very comfortable with the idea of Nandan quitting a stable job. We were both young, didn’t know any better and had nothing to lose,” says Rohini.

At Infosys, Nandan was made in charge of the company’s overseas operations. Rohini quit her job and for seven years, the Nilekanis lived a nomadic life — travelling across the United States with four suitcases. Since Rohini was in the US on a non-working visa, she couldn’t get a regular journalist’s job. “Instead, I had a variety of other short-term experiences. I worked for a public access TV, hosted a weekly Asia news show, worked with a ‘Women for Peace’ movement and spent hours reading in public libraries,” says Nilekani. She calls these her years of rapid education.

This was also the time when Nilekani bonded big-time with the other wives of Infosys. At that time, the company was growing and funds were in short supply. “If we were located in the same town, we’d live together to cut costs. This made us very close,” says Nilekani. The seven Infosys wives continue to get together for lunches and movies even now.

With four suitcases and no mother, Nilekani refused to have children while in the US. “I waited to get back to India,” she says. The couple returned to Bangalore in the late 1980s and Nilekani went back to journalism — she joined Sunday as a correspondent.

Although Nilekani quit her job when she became a mother, she was brimming with creative energy. That’s when she wrote her first novel, a medical thriller, Stillborn. Though Nilekani considers herself a born storyteller, the book happened out of the blue. “I was reading about an experiment conducted on radioactive rotis. It fascinated me so much that I began researching on medical ethics and drug trials and wrote the book,” she says.

Sometimes, it helps not to plan. Nilekani’s second book — which is set in the nuclear industry — has been in the planning stages for 10 years now. She had almost given up on it, but now that husband Nandan is writing a book, something’s stirring in her again, she says. “I must give him some competition,” laughs Nilekani, who is a yoga and Hindustani classical music buff. All the four Nilekanis are voracious readers.

The author in Nilekani might have suffered from a long-drawn writer’s block, but she remained an active philanthropist. She started an NGO, Akshara Foundation — which provides pre-school education to slum children — and chaired a non-profit publishing house for children’s books, Pratham. And when she earned Rs 100 crore from the Infosys American Depository Receipt (ADR), she started a trust, Arghyam — which means ‘offering’ in Sanskrit, and is also the name of her Bangalore bungalow — for water conservation.

One would think it takes a heart of gold to give Rs 100 crore away in charity. But Nilekani says she simply didn’t need the money. “I didn’t want to buy diamonds and jets, so what would I have done with the money,” she says. The philanthropist believes in walking the golden middle path. “It’s not that I don’t live well,” she says, waving her hand across her luxurious drawing room. “But I believe in limits,” she adds.

She also believes that a huge economic disparity between the rich and the poor is not healthy for society. “Disparity can lead to discontentment. It’s very important for the wealthy to give something back to society,” Nilekani believes.

After all the talk of charity and disparity, Nilekani cringes at being called a first wife of corporate India. She calls the Corporate First Wives Club a figment of the Indian media’s imagination. “We are all doing our own things. There’s no need to club us together into a union of wives,” she says. She adds that urban Indian women, across the board, are now educated, independent and doing relevant work. “They’re not into kitty partying any more,” says Nilekani.

Rohini Nilekani certainly isn’t. Her car’s been waiting and she has to rush to chair an Arghyam meeting. She plans to use her time in the car to clear her pending post.

Who said Mrs Riches don’t have problems?