A.K. Malhotra Chairman and managing director, MBD group

He started his first business with a seed capital of Rs 1 lakh. Today, the company has grown to Rs 200 crore and has forayed into areas beyond its original mission. A.K. Malhotra, chairman and managing director of the MBD group, has written yet another chapter in the book of successful entrepreneurs.

Malhotra, born in Jalandhar, did his schooling till Class VIII. He wasn’t bookish, though he was forced to become bookish. His father was a small bookseller and due to family compulsions, Malhotra had to join the business. “I was just 13 when I started selling books at the Malhotra Book Depot (MBD),” says he. “But selling books in a cramped space was not what I wanted to do. After three years, I decided to move away.”

Malhotra had earned Rs 2 lakh by then. After giving Rs 1 lakh to his father, he began his first publishing company. That was in 1965. He thought big even then. “My aim was that every literate person in India should have an MBD book,” he says.

Malhotra remembers that in the sixties, it would take two months to publish a single book. “In those days, composition for books was done by hand using lead. There was no concept of offset printing.”

Malhotra had compiled his first book for first year BA students when he was only 20. After that, there was no looking back.

At that time, textbooks were expensive and usually written by a handful of qualified people. MBD introduced capsule help books, which were cost effective, easy to understand and available all over the country. It became a rage amongst students.

Meanwhile, the unfinished education was also taken care of. Malhotra appeared as a private student for his matriculation and completed his graduation with BA honours, when he was 21. In 1986, he finally moved to Delhi and his greatest achievement, as he likes to put it, was acquiring the Gulab Bhavan building, where the company’s head-office is now situated.

MBD had begun extending its business beyond Punjab a while earlier. Soon, its printing presses sprung up across the country in areas like Ernakulam, Jharkhand, Goa, and Bangalore. By 2002, it was a company with a national presence. MBD now specialises in help books, textbooks for children from nursery to Class X and books for leisure reading.

In 2002, Malhotra decided to spread his wings. MBD entered the hospitality segment. Says Malhotra, “Although I had limited access to education, my daughters have done their masters in business administration. I could see that they were raring to go in the corporate world and it is for them that I decided to venture into a new sector.”

Malhotra tied up successfully with reputed international hotel chain Radisson. Thus was born the Radisson MBD hotel in Noida. It is completely managed by his daughters Sonica and Monica. Malhotra is proud of the fact that the Radisson MBD Hotel has recently been conferred the Best Franchisee of the Year Award in the category of five-star deluxe hotels across India.

The group has also entered the real estate and mall development business under the brand name MBD Neopolis. Malhotra says the real estate offerings will include malls, entertainment and five-star hotels in Ludhiana and Jalandhar. Apart from this, there is a paper mill and a planned foray into the jewellery market.

Is all this too much to tackle? Evidently no, since Malhotra says that he believes in delegation. The last thing he would do is breathe down his colleagues’ necks. Ask him about his management style, and he explains, “I have always believed that business is one large family, each person with his unique style.”

Malhotra’s advice to youngsters who want to make it big in life is simple ? work hard and persevere. He is the recipient of several state awards, but that has not changed the god-fearing man. For him the day still begins at 6.30 am when he spends two hours exercising and praying to God.

At 61, Malhotra is still as excited as a teenager about the group’s newest venture ?MBD Alchemie. “Alchemie is a pioneer project on e-learning in India,” says he. “We are building an education portal that will be the best. It will enable mass education through standardised content.”

A publisher, a real estate developer and a hotelier, Malhotra plays varied roles. Yet, his first love remains the books.

As told to Aparna Harish in Calcutta