Not quite just a techie

ICE PEOPLE

Chinar Deshpande

He is not your typical techie. Before work, marriage and children took over, Chinar Deshpande used to play table tennis at the state level in India.

He taught martial arts in the US and used to exhibit paintings. He also played cricket for Hindustan Lever for two years during his stint there.

These days the challenge of setting up an advanced IT infrastructure for Pantaloon Retail India keeps its chief information officer Chinar Deshpande on his toes.

"Pantaloon is planning to set up 80 stores in the next three years. The real challenge is to deliver the long term IT strategy for this organisation by making the system independent of me or others once it is delivered," he says.

So where is he headed after that? "Movies, politics and writing a book are options that have crossed my mind," says Deshpande. Hardly any surprise, considering that his wife's family has a film background.