In my final year at IIT, I took it upon myself to have chai with every batchmate – call it the ultimate chai quest. The EE building was my morning chai haven, and the MB canteen, despite its awful samosas, hosted my post-lab afternoon sessions. However, we were not unaccustomed to the horrible food, so no eatery was off-limit.

Did I meet every one of the 250 batchmates? Unfortunately, no. However, I bet I gave Forrest Gump a run for his money in being everywhere. Since I was hanging out everywhere, even today, most batchmates are unclear about the department and hostel I belong to.

We organized our batch’s 20^th reunion in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, in the summer of 1995. On the last day, after our spouses and children had gone to bed, single malt bottles were emptied, and most of our money was lost in Teen Patti; we were inspired to establish a legacy for our batch. It was not going to a new building, remodelled tennis court, fancy EE chair, or student scholarships. Our legacy would be creating a thriving alumni organization that rivals Harvard, Yale, or MIT. Several of my batchmates, led by Anil Kshirsagar, created the Heritage Foundation in the US. Kirat Patel helped rejuvenate IITBAA in Mumbai. And the rest is history.

On the personal side, community service runs deep in my family, as well as my wife’s family. Even today, my wife spends full time volunteering at several community organizations. So, I am home alone and decided that I might as well do something useful.

We all know that an educated workforce is essential for economic growth, and good education needs money, which is only possible with growth. India is starting the virtuous cycle of development and education and IITs must play their part in training innovative, entrepreneurial leaders. Fifty years ago, IITs focused on superior technical education but were hardly concerned with innovation or leadership. Much of my work is geared toward innovation, learning-by-building, and entrepreneurship. Besides IITB, IITGN and IITH have shown interest in expanding their curriculum. Newer IITs, like any green-field operation, have more freedom to structure their curriculum. Older institutions have scale on their side. So, working with old and new generates ideas that can be cross-fertilized at scale.

Entrepreneurship and philanthropy are like salt and pepper for meaningful impact. We selected areas with the greatest potential impact through technology. With India’s rapidly growing middle class and meagre household healthcare spending, we decided to target medical devices for entrepreneurship. Healthcare start-ups are challenging to nurture as they need incredibly long gestation periods. After all, we are dealing with human life instead of a video game or e-commerce. The work at IITH is on training and then supporting med-tech startups. Stanford pioneered a methodology for med-tech innovation. We were fortunate to have two Stanford faculty mentor us in setting up the Centre for Healthcare Entrepreneurship (CfHE).

Another area of interest was learning-by-building. Most alumni will remember with horror their time spent in a machine shop. Those were probably the only machines IIT engineers used, and it left a pretty bad taste. They learned nothing. The work at IITGN is around learning-by-building or Makerspace-centred curriculum. To that end, a batchmate, Hemant Kanakia, started a new foundation called the Maker Bhavan Foundation. Since then, we have set up Tinkerer’s Labs and Makerspaces in nearly a dozen institutions.

Outside IITs, I am worried about the state of Indian languages. Nearly ten years ago, we began a movement to digitally distribute classic 19^th and 20th-century Gujarati literature. It has picked up speed, and I am hopeful that by the time I die, we will have preserved and made nearly all literature that shaped Gujarati culture during its transformative period freely accessible.

Finally, no responsible person should escape our generation’s primary responsibility: climate change. We must, as global citizens, influence our governments to act. We must also change our habits. Additionally, we can cause meaningful change in our local communities. I am involved in local climate mitigation after years of devastating fires and droughts in the San Francisco/Bay area. Others could be involved in recycling, reforestation, or water management. There is no end to the opportunities that exist in our immediate neighbourhood.

When the Indian Prime Minister announced his appointment, I wrote to Nandan, offering assistance. I happened to be in Mumbai in July of 2009 when Nandan assumed office. As part of the first activity of his appointment, he organized a one-day meeting of “user stakeholders.” He was kind enough to set up the meeting on the day I could visit Bangalore. We had representation from financial, public health, financial inclusion, and primary education organizations. Each representative talked about how they would use the Unique ID and what problems it could solve. For example, a LIC executive commented that he had only one major problem: “People who are alive claim to be dead, and people who are dead claim to be alive.” If UID can fix this problem, LIC can dramatically expand into remote areas. One after another, they discussed the issue of credit, payment, infant health, and migrant children’s education. The potential impact of a successful UID scheme was mind-boggling.

Nandan Nilekani providing fingerprints for Aadhaar Enrollment

On the spot, I decided I needed to be in Bangalore to be part of the project. I flew home (California), packed my bag, and informed my wife (in that order). Our goal was to roll out the production version of the system in a year. The first person to receive an Aadhaar number was in September 2010 in Maharashtra by the PM. The system enrolled half the population of India in four years, or a sustained rate of half a million people per day for four consecutive years. That is a system at scale. Today, 400M eKYC and 1.3B Aadhaar authentication are done monthly. Aadhaar, UPI, and India (Digital) Stack are the Avengers of digital identity and have touched and impacted every person in the country directly.

Yes, IIT Bombay can take credit for three key alums leading the charge.

UIDAI’s official Technology Office (Bangalore), aka my drawing room (2009-2010)

I find the term “corporate social responsibility” misleading. We enjoy our quality of life because people before us built the infrastructure for us. Similarly, every corporation is built on the infrastructure created by society, from schools and hospitals to roads and commerce. A thriving, prosperous society supplies trained human capital and is also the target market of the company’s products. There is no dual responsibility. It is in the company’s self-interest to support the community’s health.

Many of us are now focused on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). A company that represents the demography of society has a natural competitive advantage over others.

“Try to leave this world a little better than you found it” was the simple message of Sir Robert Baden-Powell, the founder of the Boy Scouts. It has been my guiding principle. I am also influenced by Peter Singer when he argues that there is no morally relevant difference between failing to help a drowning child and failing to help someone who could be saved by a donation to charity. His concept of utilitarian philanthropy resonates with me.

GoI Officials releasing Standards Document (Dr. Gairola,DG NIC; Nandan Nilekani, Ram Sewak Sharma, DG UIDAI; Mashru)

IITB has incredibly accomplished alumni. The greatest contribution the alums can make is with their time.  We have the world’s best academicians, entrepreneurs, industrialists, politicians, strategists, and civil society advocates. IITB can distinguish its unique position by leveraging the alums. The alumni can make the greatest contribution by helping IITB excel.

I went through three life-altering events during my stay at the campus. The first is the most common experience of many fellow alums. I turned into an adult full of confidence and energy. I developed a group of friends who are closer to me today than most of my family. The second is less common. I met my future wife, who, by the way, immediately felt I was qualified because I was an IITian! The third is rare. On one Friday night, I fell in love with computers, which shaped my career.

Prof. Isaac’s baby, Mink-2 Console

In my days, CS was neither a department nor a major. Prof. Isaac headed a computer centre consisting of an ancient 4K byte Russian computer. Besides using paper tape that predated punch cards (now you know how antique Minsk-2 was), serious computing required sitting on the light-bulbs-lit console to run a program. So, console time was precious, and UGs were at the bottom of the priority queue. I, a ME major, did not even appear on the waiting list. However, Prof. Isaac was kind enough to let me have an entire night of computer time when everyone else did not want it, i.e., on a Friday night when a popular movie was being screened in the Convo. That night changed my professional life. I found my North Star. Joining Berkeley at a time when “Silicon Valley” was in its embryonic stage provided all the opportunities I needed to follow my love.

Prof. Isaac was a mentor who inspired passion and fun. He was full of life and a rare faculty member who would invite students to his home for drinks. On the other hand, Prof. Sukhatme was a sage with deep wisdom and clarity of thought. Visiting him today reminds me of the alumni students visiting Mr. Chipping in Goodbye, Mr. Chips.

Prof. Isaac, 10 days before he passed away in 2009 (with Sanjay Jain)

When I joined IITB, my older brother was in his last year. My strategy to escape ragging in H3 was to sit with one of my brother’s batchmates, Sriram Udupa, for dinner. As we returned from the dinner, no other senior dared to take me to their room. It worked flawlessly until the ceremonial last day when my brother’s other batchmates decided I could not be spared from the quintessential hostel experience. So, I was dragged into a senior’s room and gently ragged. As I got older, I wondered who this guy was and wished to take revenge. Years went by, and the desire faded in the background. About ten years ago, I took up bicycling, and a friend who happened to be from IITB became my senior buddy. We biked all over.  We climbed 1,000 M mountains and rode 100K for good beer. On one of those rides, he happened to describe his hostel room, which I immediately recognized as the room in which I was ragged. Now, as life comes full circle, I get a lifetime of free beer from him.

Prof. Sukhatme once said, “IIT Bombay has a tryst with excellence,” a take on Jawaharlal Nehru’s August 15, 1947 speech. His following sentence equally applies to IIT Bombay, “Now the time has come when we shall redeem our pledge – not wholly or in full measure – but very substantially.”