Mohammed Anwar Ahmed, 60, resides in the sleepy town of Amalner in district Jalgaon, Maharashtra. His father owned a large farmland in the 1970's. The father's untimely death in 1980 left the four sons to lead different paths in their lives. They sold the land and divided the proceeds of Rs.80,000 equally among themselves. Mohammed, the youngest of the four, then aged 27, was married for two years and had a year old son. On parting with his brothers, he was at crossroads and did not know the path he should choose for himself as all his working life he had worked on the fields. His one brother left Amalner while the two started their own shops.
WHAT'S SO SPECIAL ABOUT AMALNER?
In 1947, Chairman of WIPRO Ltd. and philanthropist Azim Premji's father Mohammad Hussain Hasham Premji set up the company's first plant here to manufacturer vegetable ghee, vanaspati and refined oils. It was then called Western India Vegetable Products Ltd. and had got listed on the stock exchange in 1946. Over the years many residents of Amalner worked at the plant and several residents were shareholders of the company. In 1966, Mr.Azim Premji became Chairman of the company.
A CHANCE MEETING
As Mohammed Anwar Ahmed sat near a tea shop in Amalner, a young stock broker from Bombay (now Mumbai) named SatishShah stopped to ask a question. This meeting would change the life of Mohammed Anwar Ahmed. Satish Shah had come toAmalner to buy as many shares as he could on behalf of some clients in Bombay. The question that Satish Shah asked was : “Do you know anyone here who owns shares in that factory?” pointing to the WIPRO plant. Mohammed replied that the owners of the factory stays in Bombay. In short 15 minutes, Satish explained to Mohammed, how owning a share could make one a part owner in the company. This made Mohammed inquisitive and the meeting lasted for 30 more minutes. Mohammed helped Satish Shah go door to door to collect shares from willing sellers (in very small towns nearly everyone knows each other) and for himself bought 100 shares of Rs.100 face value, thus investing Rs.10,000 from the total of Rs.20,000 that he had. The rest, he invested in starting a trading business.
THE JOURNEY TO WEALTH
From then on Mohammed started to think himself as part owner of WIPRO (and rightly so) and vowed never to sell a single share till Mr. Azim Premji is at the helm. Here is how his initial investment of Rs.10,000 grew to over Rs.500 crores.
He had invested in 100 shares at face value of Rs.100 in 1980. The initial investment was Rs.10,000.
In 1981, the company declared a 1:1 bonus. He now had 200 shares.
In 1985, the company declared 1:1 bonus. He therefore had 400 shares.
In 1986, the company split the share to Rs.10. He thus had 4000 shares.
In 1987, the company declared 1:1 bonus. He hence had 8000 shares.
In 1989, the company announced a 1:1 bonus. Now he had 16,000 shares.
In 1992, the company declared a 1:1 bonus. By now he had 32,000 shares.
In 1995, the company declared a 1:1 bonus. He then had 64,000 shares.
In 1997, the company declared 2:1 bonus. He now held 1,92,000 shares.
In 1999, the company split the share to Rs.2. He now had 9,60,000 shares.
In 2004, the company declared 2:1 bonus. He thus had 28,80,000 shares.
In 2005, the company declared 1:1 bonus. He came to have 57,60,000 shares.
In 2010, the company declared 2:3 bonus. He now had 96,00,000 shares.
The current market price is Rs.500 per share. The shares are valued at Rs.480 crores.
Over the past 33 years, the company regularly paid out dividends and increased them almost every year. Cumulatively he received Rs.118 crores as dividend over the past 33 years. Thus by investing Rs.10,000, Mohammed gained Rs.598 crores.
He is now retired and donates freely to charity from the dividends he receives. His foreign educated children often advice him to sell the shares but he has kept his vow of not selling a single share till Mr.Azim Premji is the working Chairman.
This is a lesson - both in patience and conviction
So the lesson here is any one who has the qualities of the profitable trader can become super rich in this financial world
Maharashtra's Amalner's residents hold Rs 3000-crore worth shares of Wipro
Azim Premji recently picked Abidali Neemuchwala to help rejuvenate Wipro. As the biggest shareholder in India's fourthbiggest information technology company, Premji's concerned about Wipro's future, especially since some analysts don't really think it merits a place at the top IT table. But what of those who became stakeholders when it was a producer of vanaspati?
Many still live in Amalner in Maharashtra's Jalgaon district, some 350 kilometres away from Mumbai, where Mohammad Hussain Premji— Azim Premji's father — set up a plant to make vanaspati, ghee and cooking oil in 1947. They aren't so concerned about Wipro's underperformance over the past few years. "I have inherited these shares from my father. Why should I sell them?" demands Ashish Pahade.
The stock was bought for a few hundred rupees in the 1970s and is now worth more than Rs 5 crore. Using his dividends, Pahade has started a small-time lending business. Arvind Muthe didn't realise he owned the stock until a friend spotted his name in the list of shareholders in the annual report. The value of the shares his father left him was a few crore rupees, more than enough to pay off his debts and get out of a jam. The Daga family— two brothers and three sisters — inherited shares from their father who was a local agent for Wipro's consumer products (bulbs, soaps).
Their combined holding of 5 lakh shares is currently valued at about Rs 28 crore. It's estimated that people in Amalner hold more than 3% of Wipro stock, worth about Rs 3,000 crore at current prices. But the stakeholders — farmers, kirana shop owners, employees at local companies and retired people — are a down-to-earth lot.
There are few signs of overt affluence in what's still a small town in the India's sleepy hinterland. At the time of independence, farmers in the region cultivated groundnut, the source of the edible oil that Premji senior was selling through what was then known as Western India Vegetable Products Ltd. Shareholders didn't see much by way of gains in the early years, recalled Shantilal Jain, who worked at the factory.
A rights offer in the late 1970s wasn't fully subscribed and Jain was asked to help make up the numbers. He bought one share at a face value of Rs 100. It didn't seem like a great deal. "Its price fell below the face value and there were no buyers even at Rs 35. Rs 100 at that time was not a small amount and it was not easy to sell it at a loss. So I decided to hold the share," Jain said. Azim Premji would transform Wipro into a global IT services company.
The worth of that Rs 100 share, after adjusting for splits and bonuses, is now Rs 5.5 crore. Jain, who is 77, has sold some of it but still holds stock valued at more than Rs 1 crore. Rameshlal Korani has been able to build a house funded by Wipro dividends and stock sales. He's named it Wipro. The biggest bet was probably that of Muhammad Anwar Ahmed. He happened to meet a broker who visited Amalner to buy Wipro shares from the locals in 1980. He invested Rs 10,000, half of all he had.
That's worth Rs 500 crore now. Ahmed shifted from Amalner to Nashik a few years ago but still keeps in touch with friends and family. For Amalner's Wipro shareholders, the stock has provided a dependable source of income. None of them would ever want to let go entirely, regardless of what analysts say. "Why should I sell all the shares and buy any other asset. Price volatility does not bother me.
Total dividends I have got are in crores and worth more than my shares' value," said Korani. Jain said: "If needed, I will sell 10-20 shares in a year but that's it. As long as the company exists, these shares will remain with us. We trust Sethji (Premji). Whatever he does is will be good for us."
