Hot Seat

In the orbit of greatness

Known for his generous loquacity in the trade circles, Om Prakash Sahgal's commercial success has its foundation in specialisation. Express TravelWorld goes behind the scene to find out more about the man himself

No matter where you meet Om Prakash Sahgal, he is always full of vigour and zest for life. This has come not only from a disciplined exercise regime but also from a lifetime of positivity.

His day begins at 5.00 in the morning with yoga and a walk on the Worli sea front, where he has been conducting a laughter club for almost a decade. Work starts at 10.00 and stops only by 8.00 in the evening after which he is invariably tied up with some trade event. "No matter how late I reach home, I make it a point to surf news channels at least for half an hour," he says. So how does this man, who fills every unforgiving minute with work worth sixty seconds? "If you work with dedication, the rewards will come to you automatically. Sadly, today's generation expects everything fast and works only for the returns,” says a disappointed Sahgal.

It's all about the attitude

Besides a strong work culture, positive thinking is what defines this man. "I am 100 per cent positive thinking person, no matter what the problem is and that's what keeps me going," he beams. And the confidence is catching.

This director of Orbit Tours & Trade Fair is now in the process of floating a new venture called Inorbit Tours & Travels that will exclusively cater to the MICE market. "This is spearheaded by my sister's son-in-law Tarun Malhotra. We felt a need for specialisation of services for the corporate world. We will be organising events abroad like product launches, conferences, team building programmes, help companies find partners in different countries, etc," he reveals.

This sounds like a job for the industry chambers but Sahgal says he wants to his bit. "The intention is not to just earn money but to make a contribution to the industry. We want to help companies set up offices in different countries and we will help them identify special export zones abroad where Indian companies could get a lot of incentives. We will also launch industrial study tours. The idea is to go beyond the existing framework of organising and catering to just travel and ancillary needs of the corporate clients," he says.

Train from Pakistan

He reveals a little about his past. His family, including five siblings, came to Mumbai from Pakistan after the partition and that is where he finished his schooling. Though his father was an eye specialist, Sahgal decided to venture into business and set up his own printing and packaging business in 1950, which is still running.

So how did he decide to get into the intricacies of corporate travel? It was in 1972 when he came across an international exhibition on the printing industry in Germany called Drupa. He adds, "I attended the exhibition as a visitor and was surprised at the scale of the event. There were hardly any Indians. I went to the organisers to get the figures and they told me a total of 1,40,000 people from 90 countries were attending it, out of which only 18 persons represented India."

This left him disappointed but also made him think. "I was only thinking how such fairs could help our small scale industrialists and entrepreneurs. But there was no one to promote them. The Indo-German chamber had been unsuccessful in organising groups from India for their fairs. Even the major players in the travel industry were not doing anything about this so I decided to take up the task and asked the Indo German chamber for support," he says. Sahgal then decided to not only promote Drupa but also agreed to promote a trade fair for the plastic and the textile industries for the chamber. "The success of these events pushed me further and I was forced to make it a business option, which is when I established Orbit in 1984, slowly expanding operations to cover exhibitions for almost all industries," he says. He has not looked back since. In 1990, Orbit received the Indo German award for contribution to bilateral trade and has received the same award twice after that.

So does he have any message for the travel trade? "I feel that the trade depends too much on air ticket commissions. They need to come out of their shell and become travel consultants, expand horizons with other services. Agents also need to embrace technology and use it to their advantage. Adopt or perish," he advices.

Leisure talk

His association with travel isn't limited to work. Ask him how many countries he has visited and he simply replies that he is currently on his 23rd passport! Laughing, he adds, "People have asked me to try for the Limca Book of Records." And although he has visited all countries repeatedly, Switzerland and Japan remain his favourites - "Switzerland for its natural beauty and Japan for the technology that it has to offer".

What he loves is to stay with local families abroad when travelling. "It helps me observe and learn the culture of the land from close range and build long-lasting friendships. I love to stay in touch with people I meet and I still correspond with folks I stayed with 25 years ago - a research scientist Dr Haruo Kazitani in Osaka," Sahgal reveals.

He recalls some of the memorable incidences while travelling, one of which occurred about eight years ago. "I was in Seattle attending a conference and realised that Alaska, where a pen friend of nearly 33 years lived, was just an hour's flight away. So I called her and insisted that I visit her. When I reached Fairbanks, she ushered me into the VIP lounge of the airport where three journalists were waiting to interview me and find out how we became friends and how we were meeting for the first time after writing to each other for almost three decades," he says. The next day's local newspapers carried an article about them. This is perhaps just one of the many interesting anecdotes. He says, "People have asked me to write a book on my travel experiences, and maybe some day I will." Until then.