The Dukaandaar Mindset

Chapter 1: Born Behind the Counter
My playground was not a park filled with swings or slides. It was the shop floor. While other kids my age were playing with cricket bats, remote-control cars, or video games, I found myself surrounded by ledgers, spare parts, and conversations that revolved around margins, credit, and trust. The smell of grease and the sound of shutters opening each morning were as familiar to me as the sound of a school bell.

I often say I didn’t learn my first business lesson in an MBA classroom. I learned it standing behind a shop counter, watching my father negotiate with a vendor over a cup of tea. There was no textbook, no PowerPoint, no professor, just the real-world give and take of business, played out in a small shop.

I was born and raised in Delhi, a city that itself feels like a bustling marketplace, where survival depends on hustle and connections. My schooling was in Delhi, and like many middle-class children, I was told early on that education was my ticket to a secure future. I worked hard, studied harder, and eventually earned my MBA from IMT Nagpur, followed by an executive program in Kolkata. By then, I thought I was firmly on the “professional” path, the one where you dress in crisp formals, carry a laptop bag, and measure success by designations and appraisals.

And for a short while, I lived that life. I worked in the corporate world at a large, structured, and methodical organization. I had a desk, a team, and a predictable monthly salary. In fact, I was even on the verge of a promotion. On paper, it all looked perfect. My family felt proud. My friends saw me as “settled.” I should have been content.

But I wasn’t.

Inside, I felt a restlessness I couldn’t shake off. I realized that while the corporate environment gave me stability, it didn’t give me excitement. I craved risk. I wanted to test myself in situations where the outcome wasn’t guaranteed, where my decisions had direct consequences. In the corporate setup, there were too many buffers. No matter how much effort I put in, the results were diffused across layers of processes, approvals, and hierarchies. That predictability, which was comforting for many, was suffocating for me.

By 2016, the thought of continuing like this became unbearable. I was in my mid-twenties, young enough to take a leap and old enough to realize the cost of inaction. I often tell people that 2016 was my rebirth, the year I truly began my entrepreneurial journey. I decided I couldn’t keep waiting for the “perfect” idea or the “perfect” timing. If I wanted to do something of my own, I had to begin.

But begin where? That was the bigger question. I spent months searching, reading, and brainstorming. Every idea I looked at seemed either too far-fetched, too capital-heavy, or too far removed from my interests. My heart kept asking me to build, but my mind reminded me of reality: I couldn’t afford endless trial and error.