Survived by his spouse, son and daughter, Vaghul breathed his final in Apollo hospital in Chennai, the place he was admitted after a fall.
Vaghul’s most storied achievement, one which ensured his place in Indian banking historical past, was constructing the ICICI model in finance.ICICI is right this moment India’s second greatest financial institution by m-cap, after HDFC. His five-decade-plus stint within the monetary sector, which began when he cleared an examination for SBI probationary officer in 1957, was dotted with accomplishments.
Vaghul: The proper man in the correct job at the correct time
A recipient of the Padma Bhushan in 2009, Vaghul was the youngest financial institution chairman, main Bank of India at the age of 44. He was additionally the youngest chairman of the Indian Banks Association.
There was a degree although when Vaghul left banking. He had risen up SBI’s ranks, mentored by one other veteran banker, SBI chairman R Ok Talwar. But these had been the heydays of Indian socialism. Bureaucrats thought they knew how banks ought to be run. Vaghul left banking, unwilling to observe bureaucratic diktats. Unusually for a person who handled cash, he spent a lot of his break from finance learning spirituality at Swami Chinmayananda’s Ashram in Rishikesh. He additionally had a stint as director of the National Institute of Bank Management.
The job he took when he rejoined banking was the one which got here to outline him, and alter Indian banking. In 1985, he took over the reins of what was then the Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India (ICICI).
ICICI was then a growth finance establishment, envisioned very a lot in pre-reforms mould. But India was already in churn. Vaghul’s time period noticed India getting hit by the steadiness of funds disaster, and out of that disaster the delivery of financial reforms. He was the correct man in the correct job at the correct time. He helmed ICICI via these tumultuous years, merged ICICI with ICICI Bank, having foreseen that the sharp rise in rates of interest within the Nineteen Nineties would hit growth finance establishments.
To him goes the credit score of constructing India’s first credit standing company, Crisil. He arrange ICICI Securities as an unbiased funding financial institution. Under him, ICICI was the primary courageous few which ventured into new age banking.
For most bankers, that might have been an achievement sufficient. But Vaghul was a pioneer in one other, equally pathbreaking means. He broke the mould of stodgy recruitment practices that outlined most of India Inc by, first, being an awesome expertise spotter and, second, being a agency believer in a gender-neutral meritocracy. Vaghul’s ICICI recruited and mentored girls financiers at a time the cash sport was virtually solely male. And it was Vaghul who headhunted Ok V Kamath from Asian Development Bank. Kamath, who went on to turn out to be a banking nice himself, took ICICI to the subsequent stage as a liberalised India opened up markets and alternatives. Not simply Kamath, a lot of India’s monetary sector leaders right this moment – (*88*) chief Madhabi Puri Buch, Multiples Asset founder Renuka Ramnath, Kalpana Morparia, who headed J P Morgan India for over a decade, Shikha Sharma, who led Axis Bank for 9 years, and ICICI Bank chief Sandeep Bakhshi – had been all noticed and mentored by Vaghul.
Per Kamath, Vaghul gave a free hand to him however was all the time there as a frontrunner, a buddy, thinker and information. “I have always looked up to Vaghul as my mentor,” stated Kamath. “He brought this freshness of doing something different, something innovative and at scale, and drove its implementation. We quickly put in place a strategy function, thought of new business ideas, started recruitment at scale and built the foundation of this new ICICI,” Kamath recalled.
One of the various tales of Vaghul’s distinctive management type was about him empowering younger executives at ICICI. He allowed anybody, nevertheless junior, to carry a credit score proposal to the highest financial institution committee so long as they may defend it earlier than the panel. Even now, few firm heads throughout sectors can be keen to bypass hierarchy like this. That’s what, these who labored with him say, made him a rare chief.
Tributes poured in for Vaghul on Saturday. RBI governor Shaktikanta Das described him as “a visionary…(who) made huge contributions to India’s financial sector”. “Every interaction with him was refreshing,” he stated.
Anand Mahindra, chairman, Mahindra & Mahindra, stated Vaghul was a “titan of Indian business” and “one of the most inspiring and generous” individuals he had ever met. Congress’ Jairam Ramesh, describing Vaghul as “one of India’s most distinguished bankers”, recalled his “wonderful sense of humour”.
