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Short Biography of Smt. Anu Aga |
Anu Aga – a Padmashri awardee and a member
of the Rajya Sabha, is an Indian business
woman and social worker,and is presently the
Chairperson of Teach for India.
Mrs. Aga led Thermax Ltd., the Rs. 32.46
billion energy and environment engineering
business, as its chairperson 1996–2004.
Anu started her career in Thermax in 1985
and later headed its human resources
division from 1991 to 1996. She took over as
Chairperson of Thermax, retiring in 2004 and
succeeded by her daughter and company
vice-chairperson, Meher Pudumjee. Anu has
since remained on company's board of
directors and involved with social work.
Thermax came into being by harnessing the
power of steam, produced by boilers. The
company first started with producing small,
once through, baby boilers to cater steam
required at that time by the hospitals.
Thus, the business was established in 1966.
Originally known as Wanson India Ltd, it was
manufacturing small boilers at a unit in
Dadar, Mumbai. The company was renamed
Thermax Limited in 1980. On 15 February 1995
it became a public company on the Bombay
Stock Exchange. In 2009, it signed a 51–49
joint venture with US firm SPX Corporation
to provide equipment and services for Indian
power sector Indian wing is in Pune.
She is also a member of the National
Advisory Council, headed by Sonia Gandhi,
which works closely with the central
government on public policy and issues, such
as the Right to Food.
In 2010, Aga was awarded the Padmashri for
her work in the social sector, where she has
been involved with promoting communal
harmony and nurturing education. She
supports Akanksha, a non-governmental
organization that promotes school education
for the underprivileged children in Mumbai
and Pune.
She is also closely associated with the
Thermax Social Initiative Foundation (TSIS).
The foundation, in partnership with the
municipal corporations of both cities and
Akanksha, manages two schools for
lower-income groups. She is also known for
her to transparency in corporate governance.
Ms. Aga has said that an anonymous letter
from a shareholder accusing her of letting
him down forced her to take stock of the
situation. It dawned upon her that as the
largest shareholder of a public limited
company, it was her responsibility to turn
the company around even if she personally
felt she didn't deserve to be its
chairperson.
She started a full-scale reform, with help
from the Boston Consulting Group. Between
February 1996, when she took over as
chairperson of Thermax, and 2004, when she
stepped down, Ms. Aga transformed the
company into a global turnkey player in
energy and environment projects.
Ms. Aga graduated with a Bachelor's in
Economics from St Xavier's College in Mumbai
and has a post-graduate degree in medical
and psychiatric social work from the
prestigious Tata Institute of Social
Sciences (TISS). She was also selected for a
Fulbright Scholarship and studied in the
United States for four months.
A PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE
In interviews, she has often been asked
where she draws her strength from. According
to Ms. Aga, her husband often teased her for
her incessant chatter. Now, she says,
Vipassana, a form of meditation, helps in
times of distress. "It required the rigour
of maintaining silence," she said.
In an interview to Harmony, a magazine for
senior citizens published by the Anil
Dhirubhai Ambani group, Ms. Aga said she
prefers the 'early to bed and early to rise'
routine. Her day, she says, starts with
exercise, usually a mix of cycling, yoga and
walking. She doesn't watch much TV,
preferring to catch up instead with the news
through newspapers.
Her favorite watersport is snorkeling, she
told the magazine. "It is a whole new world
under the sea."
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