They all waited in their hundreds with bated breath in that sprawling lawn in Surat, awaiting the ‘divine’ announcement from the generous pauper-turned-diamond king and returned home as happy owners of cars, flats and gold-and-diamond jewellery worth a total of Rs 50 crore on Sunday.

 

In what was, perhaps, the most generous Diwali gift event anywhere in India in recent history, as Savjibhai Dholakia, a diamond worker-turned-merchant, gifted those valuables to the nearly 1,200 employees of Hari Krishna Exports Pvt Ltd who passed the ‘loyalty test’. The venue looked like a vast car mela as shining vehicles awaited their owners. Each rewardee returned with a Diwali gift worth Rs 4 lakh.

 

People recalled it like a Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL’s) AGMs held in a stadium in the past, as Savjibhai doled out jaw-dropping goodies as rewards to his ‘best performing’ employees.

 

“We don’t look at it as a bonus or incentive. But we call it a Loyalty Programme, under which we recognise our employees who have contributed great value to the growth of this company by constantly upgrading their skills over these years,” Dholakia told BusinessLine on Monday.

 

The company, which has over 6,000 employees in Surat alone and another 3,000 in Mumbai and across the world, had organised a grand celebration on Sunday at its huge private lawn inside Hari Krishna Complex on the outskirts of Surat. The 1,200 employees who were qualified for the ‘Loyalty Programme’ were given three options to choose from: a Fiat Punto car, part-payment for a 2-BHK flat or gold and diamond jewellery.

 

“We wanted our employee to live a complete life with own house and a car. Hence, the company offered Rs 4 lakh contribution for purchase of a 2-BHK flat. Those who already had a house, we offered them a Fiat car worth about Rs 4 lakh. And those who had both, we rewarded them with jewellery worth the same amount,” said Dholakia, who had bargained hard with Fiat dealer for a heavy discount.

 

Around 491 employees opted for cars, 207 preferred taking company’s contribution for new flat and the remaining over 500 employees chose to take jewellery.

 

Interestingly these employees hold job profiles ranging from diamond polishing worker to marketing executive and office executives - most of them drawing a minimum monthly salary of Rs 60,000. About 60 per cent of his total workforce is from Saurashtra, while many workers hail from North Gujarat and Rajasthan.

Dholakia had began Hari Krishna Exports in 1991 after 10 years of rigorous diamond polishing work. Today, he claims to achieve the sales turnover of Rs 6,000 crore from diamond exports for the fiscal 2014-15. Its jewellery vertical has a turnover of about Rs 700 crore.

As a recognition of the contribution of his employees to his company’s success, Dholakia introduced the Loyalty Programme two years ago. In the first year, three diamond polishing workers were gifted cars, while last year this number went up to 72.

Meanwhile, Dholakia has also set up an in-house institute, which runs one/two-year courses on diamond polishing and overall diamond polishing engineering for those interested to take up diamond polishing as a profession.

“We guarantee that trained at our institute, the person will surely get a job with starting salary of at least Rs 50,000 per month,” added Dholakia

 

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