The Indian Diaspora: A Global Perspective with Ashutosh Garg - Episode 513

The US is getting educated Indians. Even in the least recent list that has come out, the total number of illegal immigrants, Indian immigrants, was a figure of about 17,000 or 18,000. And the government of India has said that we would love to take them back. So it's not a situation of anyone ducking the question of immigration.

Welcome to Streams to Impact and be inspired to engage passionately in the work of your calling while achieving financial Financial prosperity through multiple streams of high-yield returns on investment to bring your dream of making a meaningful impact to reality. I'm your host, Dr. Allen, and I am delighted that you are joining us today. If you haven't yet, get a complimentary copy of our exclusive guide, High Yield Investment Blueprint: Secure 18%+ Returns in 60 Days. Go to our website, highyieldblueprint.com. That is www.highyieldblueprint.com. Just provide your email address and we'll send you a copy today. Today we have with us Ashutosh Garg, and we are so glad to have you with us, Ashutosh. Let's start off if you would just tell us what really inspired you to start your journey. Which has been an interesting journey from India to the United States, back to India, and really through all of those journeys, your deep involvement in international business affairs. Fascinating journey. So what inspired you to start that journey?

Okay, thank you, Allen, for inviting me and delighted to be on your podcast. So let me explain to you my own background and what has led me here. So I'm the child of a very highly decorated brigadier, brigadier general, soldier. After business school, first 17 years I worked with British American Tobacco in India, then moved out And for 8 years ran Asia for 2 large aerospace companies where we actually launched 2 big broadband satellites. And then moved out from there and followed my passion and became an entrepreneur, founded India's second largest chain of pharmacies, brought GNC from the US to India. And then 7 years ago sold my company. That's my professional and entrepreneurial journey. I've been a member of this organization called the YPO for 32 years. I was chairman of South Asia till 2019. I've served on many, many very interesting boards, but 2 very— 2 which I think are of relevance where I learned a lot. One was the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization. which is GAVI, headquartered in Geneva, where I served on the board for 8 years. And more recently, I've joined the board of the second largest cancer hospital in India. So that continues to show, you know, share my passion to be associated with healthcare. Somewhere along the line, about 15 years ago, I decided I wanted to write a book. So I wrote a book, which is first time, which is titled The Buck Stops Here. That became an absolute bestseller. And I used to write, you know, columns in magazines, etc., etc. But after my first book was published, it's almost as if I was able to throw off the shackles of The hesitation of writing. And in two two years ago, or well not two years last year in February twelve months ago, I published my ninth book, which is titled The Seven Chakras of Management: Wisdom from Indic Scriptures. My tenth book has gone for publication, which should be out in September. The working title of the book is The Power to Say No. And I'm working on my 11th book, which I should hopefully complete in the next month or so. And that book is titled Lessons from a Father. So as you can see, I write on multiple subjects because I enjoyed the process of writing, and my books fortunately are received very, very well. Finally, one other piece of my own introduction 5 and a half years ago, I decided to start a podcast, and my podcast was basically with the objective of building what I call the world's largest digital library of knowledge, experience, and wisdom. And I do believe we are amongst the largest podcasts in the world with 2,950 recordings so far, and we get about 150,000 views and listens every day. So that, Allen, is a quick summary of my life and that my life has taken me all over the world. But at the end of the day, India is home. And therefore, this is where we wanted to come back and settle down, even though our children live in Singapore and America.

Well, fascinating. journey from a military background to a passion in healthcare.

That's—

that in and of itself is really quite a transformation. Your father being a highly decorated— you said admiral, was that correct? Brigadier general.

Brigadier.

Brigadier general. So, okay. So is that— so is that in the Navy or—

No, in the Army.

In the Army, okay. So yeah, you can tell I know a whole lot about the military world here. But so what inspired you actually to take that step from a life of military, being a military child, to actually becoming a businessman? You started off, you said, in business school and business college. So you had an inspiration to take that step.

So, you know, for this, I think it's important for your viewers to understand the Indian parent's psyche. Most of us, certainly people of my vintage, and I'm from the boomers generation, were only told one thing: study, study, study. work hard, get a good job wherever it may be in the world, and, you know, make us proud, so to speak. So most parents would say the same thing. My children are millennials, but despite them doing whatever they want to do, that is exactly what I told them as well. So an Indian parent what they do is, and irrespective of what, how wealthy you are, how wealthy you may not be, the highest amount of money is spent in educating children. And whether it is technology, whether it is medicine, whether it is a business school or whatever, lawyers, the service, the administrative services, etc. So me and both my younger brothers decided that— well, my father guided us to say that instead of joining the Indian Army, why don't you people go and join the corporate sector? Because in the early '80s, the corporate sector was just beginning to come into its own, and salaries were much higher, opportunities were much higher. India was beginning to open up and therefore opportunities came up all over the world, which is why you see this massive Indian diaspora all over the world. And your country, of course, has a very large Indian diaspora. But these were all because people studied and most of them started going out from the early '70s onwards. So long-winded answer for your question, but that is how I really got into the area of the corporate world and business.

Well, it is, uh, it is fascinating to me. I mean, I'm sure you're somewhat up on, uh, USA politics. Your children live here, you've lived here yourself, and there has been a lot of of concern about immigration for the— for this particular administration, and they're taking a lot of very drastic steps in conjunction to attempting to control that. And they have the mindset that, well, that the United States is the greatest country in the world, and so everybody naturally wants to come here. That has not been my experience with immigrants that I have worked with, that immigrants love their homes like you love your home. They come here for a lot of other reasons other than the fact that this is the greatest country in the world, which is, of course, a fallacy in so many, many different ways. But speak to us about, really, I want to hear the love that you have for your country and what it is that— Well, I think— draws you, and I'm sure many Indian people, back to India?

So see, it's like this, and let me respond to your first question on immigrants. I think the challenges that are there from this administration are not for immigrants but for illegal immigrants. And Indians, I would say, who are there in the US, a very significant majority of them are educated Indians who are going into white-collar jobs. And that is an indication of why so many large US companies are now being run by people of Indian origin or people who are Indians. And a lot of them are first-generation Indians, not even second-generation Indians. So I think that is one important factor for your viewers and listeners to understand that it's the US is getting educated Indians. Even in the least recent list that has come out, the total number of illegal immigrants, Indian immigrants, was a figure of about 17,000 or 18,000. And the government of India has said that we would love to take them back. So it's not a a situation of anyone ducking the question of immigration. Having said that, your country has been— is full of immigrants, you know, and—

It's a country of immigrants.

And I do believe it offers incredible opportunities for immigrants because it's such a large country, such a well-developed market, It's a wealthy country, so people will normally want to come there. Coming to your second part of the question on why I moved back or why Indians want to move back, at the end of the day, India is home. And my wife and I live in India, but every single child both my brothers, my wife's brother, all their children are outside India. And every time I— when they ask me, you know, what are your thoughts on coming back to India, I always tell them, this is your home. India will always welcome you back with open arms. Go and earn money, go and learn best practices, and the day you choose to come back to India, it doesn't matter whether you have a US passport or any other nationality, India will always welcome you back. And that is something which I have seen with Indians. A lot of people in more expensive countries are saying that they want to move back to India. And the situation in India has also changed dramatically in the last 10-11 years. The country is the 5th largest economy, should in the next 2 years be the 3rd largest economy in the world, infrastructure has improved. So those people who are living in the US or UK or any other part of the world who said, you know, the roads are good and, you know, a lot of things, all those are catching up in our own country. And then having said that, I can live at 1/10 the cost that I would do in, say, Manhattan versus in New Delhi. So I think when Indians do decide to come back, it is a win-win. And at no stage, if I move back, is either India saying no or America saying that you can't come here back again. So that option is a huge option for every Indian to have.

Yeah, yeah, remarkable, uh, changes, uh, in the world, and, uh, the geopolitical scene is changing Drastically, and in the next 5 years it's going to change even more drastically than what it has, I think, in the last 10, 15 years.

Yeah.

And I'd like to get your opinion on this, but what I see is that the East is embracing the change and moving forward, and the United States has their foot on the brake. attempting to maintain a hegemony that, uh, that has not really been that beneficial to the rest of the world. What's your take on that?

So, um, I may not, may not agree with what you are saying, um, because I've often said this to a lot of my American friends that whatever is the direction your country is taking today is for the benefit of Americans. The people who should be complaining are people who are not American citizens. I find, on the other hand, it's the other way around. A lot of the Americans don't like their policies for whatever reasons, and I won't get into that. Maybe you and I can have a much longer debate on my perspective on that. But, you know, I think it's absolutely fair to say that, you know, come and manufacture in our country. India is doing that, China is doing that, Europe is doing that. So, you know, I guess it's fair to say, and at the end of the day, like water, the most efficient market will find its own level. And there may be— there will be short-term challenges, whether it's in India or in Canada or in any other country. But over a period of time, the most efficient will survive. And I think that is an important factor that I have always told my friends is important from the perspective of what we are seeing in America today. And, you know, it is the world's largest economy. So when that economy starts to fire and grow aggressively, then the rest of the world benefits quite significantly.

Well, there are a lot of good things about the United States. I mean, we do have a stabilized market and it is not totally and completely free of bribes, but by and large, it functions with less corruption than what we find in a lot of other places in the world. Absolutely. And it has has a a history of being an innovative country, and the it's just not the only country in the world that has innovation. Although it was a big surprise to many people when Deep State came out this this past week, and they go China doesn't have that kind of cap. Capacity and capability. Well, yeah, they do. And I think it's a big surprise to a lot of Americans that that China by far has the has more PhDs than any other country in the world. Not just by numbers. I mean per cap, they have more more PhDs than any other country in the world. They're brilliant people, and we We underestimate them at our peril. So, yes, there are good things about this country. And I, like I think most people, I love my country. We could talk on this all day long, but let's see, I'd like to talk more about, well, your book number 7.

Mm-hmm.

Chapters of Management Wisdom. That just sounds fascinating to me as you were describing that. So tell us a little bit more about—

Okay, so let me give you a little background. I've always been fascinated by the various religions of the world. And when COVID started, someone sent me a link from the Harvard Divinity School. And I ended up doing an 8-month program online on the 7 major religions of the world, which are, you know, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, and Jainism. And the last 4 came out of India, and therefore they are called Indic, I-N-D-I-C. Indic religions. So I said, you know, I was fascinated by all, a lot of these texts that were there. And India has knowledge coming from the, you know, our Indic texts which can be traced back as of now to about 5,000-6,000 years ago. And they say certainly much, much older as well. Then, so that was one data point for you. So I did all these things and then I'm not sure if you are familiar with yoga and meditation, but if you are, you will get to, you know, that there are 7 chakras or 7 nerve points in our body, which is what you focus on when you meditate to get your body up and running, so to speak. Because I spent so much time in the corporate world, I said, let me identify 7 nerve points of an organization and look at how we can draw some amazing lessons from our scriptures for each one of us. So I'll give you an example. There are 29 different topics I have covered in these 7 chakras, but one example is the whole world now talks of diversity, equity, inclusion. And this has become much more prominent from the last 14, 15 years after the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations. So I was telling somebody, and I wrote about this, that when everyone's talking of inclusion or getting more women empowerment, I said, let me take you back thousands of years. And there is a 7-star constellation, uh, which in the West you call the Big Dipper or the Great Bear. And in India, they have been referred to as the Saptarishis, which are the 7 holy men. And thousands of years ago, people discovered that in these 7 stars there are— there's a twin star constellation. And that twin star constellation is a constellation which, unlike the moon and the earth, where the moon revolves around the earth, these 2 stars revolve around each other. And the names that were given to these were of one holy man and his wife.

Hmm.

So I've said that we've had inclusion thousands and thousands of years where there was a woman named in the 7 stars or the Big Dipper. So, and there are many, many examples I have given in this book which really demonstrate how there is, you know, we tend to keep our scriptures, whether it's the Bible or whether it is any other book, whether it's the holy books of the Indic religions, We tend to keep them at an arm's length to say, oh, we will only reach out to them when we want to, when we need something from God. But it's, you know, in Hinduism, we've always believed that God is inside us. Each one of us has the Brahman, which is the universe, inside us. So what was important for me when I was writing this whole book was to keep on drawing lessons and saying, hey, it's okay to have, you know, anger, for example. We've got responses to anger in there. It's okay to talk about gratitude. It's okay to talk about failure, and so on and so forth. So that's all, that's what I did. This book has been a very big seller. It's been right at the top of the list for the last 7-8 months, and I'm hoping it'll continue.

Yeah, it sounds like a very fascinating look at how to organize corporations, but it sounds like there's a lot of organizing principles there just for—

Right.

For any kind of system, whether it's a family system or a community or a state or a nation. I'm going to have to get the book. It just sounds really, really fascinating. And then the other one I was really very interested in was Lessons from a Father. But before you go into that, Ashutosh, tell our audience how it is that they can get in touch with you and find out more about you and take advantage of the wisdom that you have to share with the world.

So, thank you, Allen. I think the best way to contact me is to reach out to me on LinkedIn. Just search for my name and you should be able to connect. I have a fairly active profile. If you're not able to find me for any reason, look for The Brand Called You, which is my podcast, but also is very easy to find. And if you reach out to me or send me a message, I generally respond within 24 hours.

Okay. So for our listeners, these— and viewers, these— this information will be in our show notes, but Ashutosh is spelled A-S-H-U-T-O-S-H, and his last name Garg is G-A-R-G. And you can find him on LinkedIn, or you can find him by a brand called You. So, so tell us about Lessons from a Father.

Um, so this book, Alan, is not yet published. Um, it will be. I'm, I'm just about to complete it. But let me tell you my hypothesis. I, I've already told you about my father, and I was very close to him. I often said that he was my closest friend until he passed away. 11 years ago at 87, I used to have lunch with him 3 times a week. And I would speak to him at least once a day, if not more. We used to live in the same city, but we used to talk. So what I said was that the role of a mother in the life of a child is can never be underscored. It is the most important. But the role of a father has traditionally been seen as a provider and a protector and not much more. So, and I was telling somebody the other day, I said that my father never ever said I love you.

Wow.

But I knew how strong his views were for me. So I mean, and today's young fathers are of course much more expressive in there. And then, you know, I was fascinated when I saw, you know, my older son expecting, and he and his wife rang me up, and we have a beautiful 3-year-old granddaughter, but they rang me up and said, we are pregnant. Right now, these are very big changes that are happening. So I said, let me write a book on different aspects of a father, the role a father plays, what are the learnings from a father. And I've also got a section on not all fathers, or maybe the right word is that some fathers could be toxic as well. So I've drawn lessons from there. And like I did in my 7 Chakras book, this time I have used knowledge not just from the Indic scriptures but the Bible as well. And it's, it's a man— and of course, uh, well-known, uh, people like Shakespeare, for example. And I was, as I was reading more, I was fascinated to see how much knowledge exists on the relationship of fathers and sons I have put a disclaimer in my author's note to say that all these scriptures in those days only spoke about fathers and sons. But I'd like you to read sons in today's context as fathers and children. So that's what the book is about. So it's a big book. It's about 70,000 words, which is almost 350 pages.

Wow.

And I'm hoping to see it out early next year because Before that book, I have one more book coming out, which is The Power of Saying No. So that should be out in September, October. And then my book on Learnings from a Father, or Lessons from a Father, should come in maybe January, February '26.

Wonderful. Well, what a life you have lived. What an example you have for all of us. Great wisdom in What you have shared with us today. It's been an honor and a pleasure having you with us. So, Enlightened Investors, thank you for being with us today. As always, a pleasure, and I hope you'll take a moment to like, share, and subscribe. And would be really appreciative if you could leave us a rating and a review. It really does make a difference. So until next time, live abundantly. We'll see you in the next episode.

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