At the Helm

'Krishnamurthy's leadership has shown that he can achieve stupendous tasks. If for any reason at all he fails, virtually the entire public sector will have to be written off for the next twenty years, ' noted the panel that chose V. Krishnamurthy as the Business India Businessman of the Year in 1987.Management of a business enterprise in India is more difficult than in other countries. There are far more uncertainties that an Indian manager has to encounter while performing his tasks--even more so in state-owned companies than in private ones. But Krishnamurthy, through his exemplary stewardship of three major enterprises, changed the rules of the game in the 1970s and 1980s.At Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, he saved the company from imminent disintegration and dispelled Indira Gandhi's impression that Indian managers did not have the ability to manage large organizations. At Maruti, he was given the responsibility of not just manufacturing a car but of modernizing the automobile industry itself. Steel Authority of India Limited was almost a sunset company when he took over, but he shook up the organization from its very foundations and put it back in a leadership position.At the Helm is the story of how a boy from the small village of Karuveli in Tamil Nadu starts out as a technician at airfields during the Second World War but goes on to script the biggest success stories of young India's fledgling public sector over the next five decades.

V. Krishnamurthy is the doyen of Indian management, having headed the country's largest and most challenging public sector companies.He was Chairman and CEO of Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, Maruti Udyog Limited and Steel Authority of India Limited. He has been Chairman of IIM Bangalore and Ahmedabad; IIT Delhi; Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar; and the Centre for Organization Development, Hyderabad. He has also been Chairman of the Technology Information, Forecasting & Assessment Council. He was Member of the National Advisory Council from 2004-08. Among other positions, he has served as Member, Planning Commission, and Secretary to the Government of India in the Ministry of Industry.Until recently, he was the Chairman of the National Manufacturing Competitiveness Council, holding the rank of a Cabinet Minister. He was also a member of the Prime Minister's Council on Trade and Industry, Prime Minister's Trade and Economic Relations Committee, Prime Minister's Energy Coordination Committee, Prime Minister's High Level Committee on Manufacturing and the High Level Advisory Group on Climate Change. He was the Chairman of the group set up by the Prime Minister for design and manufacture of civilian aircraft in India and the Co-Chairman of the empowered committee for setting up FAB facilities in India.He is Chancellor of the Central University of Tamil Nadu and the Indian Maritime University. He is Member, Board of Governors, Administrative Staff College of India, Hyderabad, and President, Academy of Higher Education (National College), Tiruchirapalli.He is Member of the Board of Trustees and Executive Committee of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and Member of the Governing Council of the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Contemporary Studies, based in New Delhi.He studied to be a Chartered Engineer and holds a Doctorate in Economics from the Soviet Academy of Sciences, a Doctorate in Sciences from the Banaras Hindu University and a Doctorate in Letters from Pondicherry University.He has been Member of the Energy Advisory Committee, the Public Enterprises Selection Board and the Telecom Restructuring Committee. He has chaired various committees including the National Committee on Quality, a committee to prepare a comprehensive white paper on the public enterprises in India, a committee to determine the policies on disinvestment in the public sector, a group to restructure oil companies in the public sector and a committee to assess the capability and infrastructure of the private sector to build conventional submarines. He was also the co-chairman of the Indo-Japan study committee.He was conferred the Padma Shri in 1973, the Padma Bhushan in 1986, the Padma Vibhushan in 2007, the Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun by the Government of Japan in 2009, the Business Leadership Award by the Madras Management Association in 1975, the 'Businessman of the Year' title by Business India magazine in 1987, the Sir Jahangir Ghandy Medal in 1988, the 'Steelman of the Year' title by The Indian and Eastern Engineer in 1989, the Tata Gold Medal by the Indian Institute of Metals in 1989, the National HRD Award in 1989 and the Special Nakajima Award by the Japan Institute of Plant Maintenance in 2007. As a mark of respect to his eminence as a visionary leader and an institution builder, and for his pursuit of excellence, the Centre for Organization Development, Hyderabad, honoured him by establishing the 'V. Krishnamurthy Award for Excellence' in 2000.He lost his wife Rajam in 2001. He has two sons, Chandra and Jayakar, and lives in New Delhi and Chennai.