Number of words: 179

Moolgaokar convinced everyone that if TELCO were to make everything from engines to spare parts, it needed to get out of the shadow of TISCO and set up a separate plant elsewhere. He chose Akurdi near Poona. A lot of land was available at low cost. He planted a few thousand trees the moment they decided on the land. To others it looked like madness, for the trees needed water, but Moolgaokar went ahead and built two artificial lakes. The whole thing then cost ` 15 lakh! Those were tough days for the Tatas to raise capital and such extravagant expenditure was quite naturally opposed by many. JRD stood behind Moolgaokar like a rock. He said:

I completely agree with what he is doing. It is not about building a manufacturing plant. Look at how we have built Jamshedpur and Mithapur. We cannot have just a dry brick and mortar building as a plant. We need the entire ecosystem around it.

Excerpted from Pg 91 of Tatas: How a family built a business and a nation by Girish Kuber