In 1958, twenty-five-year-old Sharayu Daftary started a radiator company in Mumbai with Rs. 2,00,000 and five workers. She headed Bharat Radiators as its Managing Director for 68 years, until she passed away at the age of 92.
Daughter of Lalchand Hirachand, a freedom fighter, parliamentarian, and industrialist, she was no stranger to entrepreneurship. Her uncle Walchand Hirachand was the founder of the Walchand Group (Hindustan Aeronautics, Premier Automobiles, Hindustan Construction), which stood among the pillars of independent India’s early industrial base. An economics graduate from Elphinstone College, Sharayu was born into a legacy. Yet, she was kept out of the family business. Her exclusion was not a slight. It was customary for the family business to be run by the male members of the family. Her journey to Bharat Radiators, and within it, was not rooted in her experience in the family business, which is what makes her story intriguing.
In 1952, at the age of 19, she was married to Arvind Gaurishankar Daftary and moved into her house on Malabar Hill. In the late 1950’s she sought independent work and received attractive offers on account of her lineage. During this time, the Indian government launched a scheme for the manufacture of radiators and her father, Lalchand Hirachand, was approached for it. He, in turn, asked her if she was interested. She was. Her father, however, had two conditions for her. First, she was to work on the machines herself. Second, she could receive no help from her prominent industrial family, the Walchand Group. She accepted the conditions, and at the age of 25, in 1958, she founded Bharat Radiators.
In the beginning, she had to prove her knowledge and ability. In her own words, she would “come back from work at my factory, take care of the girls and then read books”. Her husband, who was himself a voracious reader, supported her. For a woman of her time and class, married at 19 into a household that expected nothing from her except running it, her husband’s support was not trivial. It was uncommon. It is also worth noting that while she was excluded from the family business, she was not restricted from seeking her passion in the corporate world.
Workers called her ‘Tai’, Marathi for elder sister, and she is remembered working the machines herself in a sari. She did not appoint quality-control inspectors and instead told her workers that she trusted them. Giving them material specifications, she asked them to serve as their own inspectors on the production floor. Influenced by Peter Drucker’s writing on praise and effectiveness alongside her reading of Jain teachings on the equality of all atmas (souls), she went on to frame this as a management philosophy, increasing their “self-esteem and their skill and no doubt, their loyalty”. While Indian industries adapted to unionisation and witnessed strikes, by her own account, Bharat Radiators went 32 years without a strike, a go-slow or loss of manpower.
In 1971 she became the first woman president of the Automotive Components Manufacturing Association. In 1981, she became the first elected president of the Indian Merchant’s Chamber. This made her the first woman to head any chamber of commerce in the country. Nineteen years later, in 2000, she returned to head the same chamber once again. She was also the first woman to sit on the FICCI’s executive committee. For her contributions to Indian industry, in 2004 she was awarded the Padma Shri.
None of this, however, displaced her domestic responsibility. Her three daughters describe her returning from the factory to teach them kathak, cooking and multiplication tables, who remained a friend rather than a distant matriarch. Her Jain upbringing lent itself to all aspects of her life. As editor of the Jain Bodhak, the family magazine, she elaborated on how gender equality was not a modern import into Jain thought but that Jainism had always granted women the same dignity, freedom of thought and opportunity as men.
Yet, she accomplished her dream of pursuing business outside of home. What she did with the support of her husband, her brothers were entitled to. In hindsight, they ended up in the same place, running businesses. However, their journeys were starkly different. Her brother’s place in the family business was a given. A large part of this is attributed to the era itself. It does not, however, change the fact that gender equality was not an established practice, neither culturally across India nor within the Jain community.
Sharayu Daftary passed away in 2025. Her story is pinned across bulletins and community profiles as an exemplar of self-reliance and quiet determination. Her story emphasises not just her commercial success but the broader impact of her following her passion. She hailed from a prominent business family. A seat at that table would also have offered her an opportunity to pioneer. But she was not granted a seat at an established table. So, she built her own and, in doing so, set a more relatable example for women in entrepreneurship, with or without a background. Her journey illustrates a broader truth that one woman’s dream is never just hers but a precedent offering a collective opening for numerous others.
References:
- Wikipedia – Sharayu Daftary: Sharayu Daftary - Wikipedia
- Jain Samaj – Sharayu Daftary: Sharayu Daftary: Founder, Bharat Radiators Ltd.
- DNA – Mom had always been a friend: ‘Mom has always been a friend’