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We can sense the soul of the country: Ramdev

Interview with Yoga guru and Patanjali founder

Ramdev

Shishir Prashant
Yoga guru and Patanjali founder Ramdev talks to Shishir Prashant about the secret of his FMCG brand’s growth and his future plans.

Patanjali achieved a turnover of Rs 5,000 crore by the end of 2015-16. We heard that you doubled the target to Rs 10,000 crore by July-end. And now, you are talking about a Rs 50,000-crore turnover of Patanjali Yogpeeth. What is the secret of this growth?

We haven’t yet seen the bullet train (in India) but people have started seeing the growth of Patanjali. We have understood the needs of the people. In the last two decades, we have worked a lot. We can sense the soul of the country. Multinational companies don’t belong to a particular nation. They don’t contribute anything for their own nation. For such companies, there is no ideology or principle.
 

Patanjali is becoming powerful because we are doing all this work not for business, but for the prosperity of the country. This is the basic philosophy of our nation and we have put it into practice. We managed to win the trust of the people. It helped boost our growth. The growth was so high that all those products whose capacities were two tonnes each initially went up to 100 tonnes.
 
For example, tomato ketchup - it’s capacity was two tonnes initially, but now it is 100 tonnes. We had set up a 100-tonne plant for atta (wheat flour). Now, we are producing 3,000 tons daily. In future, we will need 10,000 tonnes of wheat. This is beyond the thinking of any person. But it all happened. Why? This is because we never compromised on quality.  Purity has become synonymous with Patanjali.

Initially, we set up a 10-metric-tonne plant for producing ghee. The demand has now touched 200 tonnes. In future, we are thinking of producing 400-500 tonnes of ghee. We used to make 100,000 Dant Kanti toothpaste tubes. Now, we have built up a 2.5 million tube capacity. We are heading towards a five million capacity for Dant Kanti alone. Kesh Kanti’s (shampoo) capacity was only 100,000. It is now 500,000. We are going to raise the capacity to one million.

The question is not how we will sell all these products but how we will meet the demand.  From raw material to processing and from processing to supply chain, we are working hard on these issues. Ninety nine per cent of our products are based on the raw material produced by farmers. Our new motto is a healthy India and prosperous farmers. Our efforts are now benefiting farmers.

On the issue of farmers, nearly 200-250 million people in India are living in abject poverty. How can their lot be improved?

For five years, we raised the issue of these people. It is true that nearly 400 million people are unable to earn two square meals a day. They are not getting even basic amenities such as food, clothing and shelter. The  focus of the government should be on foreign policy, making new policies for the country and providing security to the nation. (Prime Minister) Narendra Modiji is doing good work in these three fields. The onus lies on the people of our country (to do something for people below the poverty line). We have to pool together our efforts to help all those who are being denied two meals a day. It is a collective responsibility.

Recently, there was an announcement that Patanjali was entering the dairy and milk products category. How much growth and investment do you expect?

One of our main areas of focus is the cow. We are going to do three big things. We are in the process of setting up cow research and quality enhancement centres. The first centre will come up in Hardwar. We will open four more such centres in the country. We will spend around Rs 500 crore on these centres. We will rear desi cows, which can give 50-60 kg of milk daily. This is not a dream. It is going to be a reality. The very next year, we will have such cows. We have also made milk powder called Any Time Milk.

In the third phase, we will sell fresh milk, cheese, butter and other milk products. We will not make ice cream because it is not good for health. We have already acquired a dairy near Aurangabad with an investment of Rs 50-60 crore. By the end of this year you will see our products in the market. From this dairy, we will be able to collect one million litres of milk.

A few years ago, you were in news because of a big island in Scotland. What happened to it?

We got it from our friend Sunita Poddar as  donation. We have started a yoga centre there.

Nearly a decade ago, you launched Padartha food park in Hardwar. How much has been invested on it so far and what are the expansion plans on this front?

We started this food park to provide the best and the purest products to the people. We have invested Rs 500 crore so far; we will invest Rs 5000 crore more for its expansion.

The Congress and other Opposition parties have started attacking Modi again on black money. What happened to the campaign against black money?

Black money and “block money” (unproductive money) is a big problem. But we will talk about two more issues related to corruption and the prevailing system. Corruption at higher levels has been checked. But corruption at the lower level is eating away India like a termite. Transparency through technology will help curb the menace. We have to find a permanent solution. For bringing back black money, which is abroad, the government must take stringent steps.

How will you change the system?

The change will come through education. You have to bring new knowledge and new education. We have to set up a Vedic Education Board, which I think should be set up shortly. Education brings drastic changes in the process of thinking and  culture.

Do you think children are feeling stressed in schools, especially because they carry heavy loads by way of books, etc?
After yoga, ayurveda and the swadeshi movement, we are now focusing on education. We will spend 80 per cent of our profit on education. All the work we are doing now is basically to improve education in India. We will open the world’s largest university in the National Capital Region. We will also open schools in the country and teach the CBSE curriculum. Work in this direction has already started. But all these schools will not be for making money. They will be set up on self-sustainable models. We will add vedic education also. We are against the commercialisation of education.
 
After launching noodles last year, how do you view the growth in this sector?

We have already set up a new noodles plant at Sankla in Haryana. We will scale up capacity in the four or five food parks, which will come up shortly in different parts of the country. The demand for our noodles has gone up to 500 tonnes daily.

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First Published: Sep 17 2016 | 9:44 PM IST

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