6th February 2023, Dehradun: Renowned logistics and supply chain entrepreneur Bhairavi Jani shared her perspectives and thoughts on her first book ‘Highway to Swades: Rediscovering India’s Superpowers’ at a press conference held today. The book marks her debut as an author.
Addressing the media during the press conference, Bhairavi said, “My book ‘Highway to Swades’ focuses on the civilizational narrative of India while giving a voice to everyday Indians from across the country. The book is based on the 18,181 km journey that I undertook for 51 days in 2014 from the remote districts of Nagaland to the villages of Rann of Kutch to the Bazaars of Hyderabad to the interiors of India’s Deccan. The observations and discoveries made form the heart of this book and connect people and places across India through the multiple lenses of economics, markets, race, faith, history, and politics.”
Adding further, she said, “In the book, I have dedicated each chapter to a Superpower, including the Power of Enterprise, Power of Nature, Power of Heritage, Power of Creativity, Power of Knowledge, Power of Food, Power of Beauty, Power of Wellness, Power of Assimilation, Power of Inclusion, Power of Individual, and Power of Community. The book outlines in brief the Superpowers of the Indian people and charts a roadmap on how these can be applied for India’s developmental path ahead.”
Speaking about her life in Uttarakhand, Bhairavi said, “I am lucky enough to spend six months in a year in Uttarakhand, as I have a house in Munsyari. It feels sad to see the adverse change in climate in the state. But I feel that Uttarakhand has the advantage of the great Himalayas, which have the ability to transform the weather conditions, not only in the state but in the entire country. It is important to create awareness at a mass scale about the opportunity we have to partner with nature and action nature-based developmental paths because we must have the ambition to become climate warriors for the planet.”
The book was published by HarperCollins Publishers India in November 2022. In the book, Bhairavi has concisely connected the dots between India’s rich and vast civilization and the country’s road ahead as a republic.
Written in an extremely engaging and easy-to-understand manner, Bhairavi has, in the chapter ‘Power of Nature’, shown the unlikely bonds that bind the Changpa people of the cold desert wildlife sanctuary in Ladakh, the Khasis of Meghalaya and an Oxford-returned young woman in Kumaon. While in the chapter, ‘Power of Enterprise’, Bhairavi has beautifully explained how we need to open our minds and recognize that a street vendor is as much of an entrepreneur as a founder of a tech startup in cities like Bengaluru or Hyderabad. In ‘Power of Creativity’, she throws light on how our inherent superpower of creativity can help us build a thriving creative economy using new-age tech and AI.
Bhairavi is a fourth-generation entrepreneur, developmental enthusiast, and avid philanthropist. She is the Chairperson and Founder of the IEF Entrepreneurship Foundation and Executive Director of SCA Group of Companies founded in 1896. SCA Group undertakes activities in the supply chain and logistics sector.
She has been listed as one of the 30 most Powerful Women in India by the India Today publication. She has been profiled as Stree Shakti (Woman Power) person by CNBC Awaaz and featured as a Young Turk by CNBC TV 18. She has been listed as one of the 10 women exemplars by the Hindustan Times, and Business Today Magazine has featured her as the Supply Chain Maven.
