ગુજરાતના 'ભામાશા' નાનજીભાઈ મહેતા | Nanji Kalidas Mehta Success Story

Nanji Kalidas Mehta was an industrialist and philanthropist from Gujarat. He founded the Mehta Group of Industries in British East Africa, now having its head office in India. Mehta was born on 17 November 1887 in Gorana village, near Porbandar in the Princely State of Porbandar, British India. He was born in a Gujarati family of Lohana caste. He left for East Africa at the age of thirteen in 1900. He married Santoshben Mehta. Shekhar Mehta, the sports car driver, and Jai Mehta, the businessman, are his grandsons. He started his career as a trader and ventured into growing vegetable, cotton and then sugarcane in the British East Africa. Later he ventured in to sugar manufacturing, tea and coffee plantations in that region. He in his later life also started a Cement plant, ginneries, a textile unit and oil mills in India. He thus founded the Mehta Group conglomerate, which is now spread across the globe. He established the present day Sugar Corporation of Uganda Limited under the name Uganda Sugar Factory in 1924 at Lugazi. He was one of the first exporters of Uganda's cotton to Japan and other places which greatly helped in the establishment of the cotton industry in Uganda. In 1932 he established a cotton mill named Maharana Mills in Porbandar, the land for which was given at a measly sum by Maharana Natwarsinhji of Porbandar. The company employed 2500 workers at time of Indian independence in 1947. In 1956 he established Saurashtra Cement Limited in Gujarat. One of his philanthropy work include Kirti Mandir at Porbandar, which houses the ancestral house of Mahatma Gandhi and a memorial/temple built in memory of Mahatma Gandhi and Kasturba. Arya Kanya Gurukul, a Girls Resident School was started by him in 1936. Check out the video to see motivational and inspirational success story of Nanji Kalidas Mehta.

Photo and Video Credit: Shri Nanjibhai Kalidas Mehta Documentary
   • Shri Nanjibhai Kalidas Mehta Documentary  

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