On a rainy afternoon in Mumbai, inside the executive dining room at Godrej Industries Group’s sprawling Vikhroli headquarters, water droplets on the glass windows blur the view outside — a single chimney, all that remains of the company’s old chemicals factory, once the heart of its manufacturing, and now a quiet reminder of the group’s 128-year-old legacy.

At one of the tables, I am greeted with an easy smile by Nadir Godrej, the soft-spoken Chairman of Godrej Industries Group, which has in its fold multiple businesses — Godrej Consumer Products, Godrej Chemicals, Godrej Agrovet, Godrej Properties, Godrej Fund Management, and Godrej Capital, to name a few.

Godrej is that rarest species among Indian business leaders — a man equally at home with equations and existential questions. He is, as his brother Adi Godrej once remarked, “an unusual businessman” with interest in math, science, geography, writing poems, speaking multiple languages, and swimming. Part-scientist, part-philosopher, and, above all, a man with one eye on ethical legacy and the other firmly fixed on the future.

We are meeting over lunch — a buffet spread that is an understated yet thoughtful mix of butter garlic prawns, grilled pomfret, and mushroom ravioli... its elegant simplicity mirroring the host’s personality.

Science and poetry

Godrej’s journey began in a bustling corner of Mumbai. “I went to St Xavier’s High School,” he says, the same as his brother, father, and uncles. “So that was a big part of my early experience.” He grew up in a household that valued intellectual curiosity. “My mother encouraged me to do whatever I wanted. I ended up studying. I was quite interested in science,” he says.

His mother’s own academic journey, teaching English, left a lasting impression, as did the creative fire of his maternal grandmother, “a poet for the Indian independence movement”.

This intertwining of the empirical and the artistic resurfaces as he talks of his passions: “I was thinking of academia, doing a PhD, something like that.” This academic pursuit led him first to IIT, and then MIT, a master’s at Stanford, and an MBA at Harvard.

If science and academia were guideposts, poetry became the soul’s outlet. He has penned over 500 poems on topics that include his family, business, and experiences, and they have been published.

Home beckons

Even as Godrej was contemplating a life abroad in America, a historic circumstance drew him back home. “The Emergency came in India, and my brother was quite worried. It was a difficult time, and he suggested I come back.”

So began his career in the family business. “I had no work experience outside Godrej, other than some university jobs,” he says. That lack was soon put to the test in the mid-1980s — “the most troubled time I ever had in business” — at Gujarat-Godrej Innovative Chemicals Limited (later renamed Godrej Soaps in 1996 and Godrej Industries in 2001), which faced a “₹90 crore loss”.

He describes how he turned it around with the help of his team, finding demand abroad for its alpha olefin business. It was unviable to manufacture in India, since they couldn’t import the raw materials. “We developed markets in Brazil, China, Argentina, Europe... all over the world,” he says.

While Godrej regrets missing the opportunity to pursue R&D at MIT, he found redemption in later years through relentless innovation back home, with his company now holding 71 patents.

Business, for Godrej, has been a sometimes bumpy voyage of expansion. In the 1990s, when the Indian economy was opening up, the group faced competition from foreign players. “We had to take a call — either shut down or move ahead through partnerships,” says Godrej. Soon there were joint ventures with marquee companies like Procter & Gamble for soaps and detergents, GE for white goods, Hershey’s for chocolates, and Pillsbury for food products. These tie-ups allowed the group to venture into new areas, but they did not last long. Godrej ended up buying out the foreign partners in most cases. “We learned a lot from them,” he reasons.

A keen swimmer, Godrej has taken on open water around the world: “I’ve swum from island to island in the Maldives, and once in Fiji.” He laughs about close shaves (“once or twice I hit rocks... nothing very serious”) and still swims “quite regularly”.

Languages are a passion, too. He reels off, “French, German, Gujarati, Hindi and English… can maybe follow Spanish and some Italian.” A summer of speaking French with tourists on a rented sailboat in Corsica turbocharged his fluency; he even attempted poetry in French, he says.

Danger, too, has brushed past him more than once. He narrowly escaped the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai. He was set to receive the Légion d’honneur from the French government. This event was in the past hosted at Mumbai’s Taj Mahal Hotel. “But this time the Alliance Française suggested the newly opened Four Seasons. That change, quite literally, saved us,” he reminisces. Prior to this, while travelling in Iraq, “there was a bomb in the airport just after I flew out”; and at another time, he “crash-landed in Chennai” after the aircraft was damaged by an explosive device. “The pilot did a great job,” he says matter-of-factly, describing how passengers jumped from the aircraft after the emergency landing.

Smooth transition

When the Godrej group decided to restructure its businesses last year, it did it without fuss. The division between the Adi Godrej and Jamshyd Godrej branches was strikingly cordial. “Credit goes to my nephew Pirojsha (Adi’s son),” says Nadir, “who did a lot of the negotiation... a little bit of give-and-take and a little bit of continuing cooperation... Godrej Properties still does some development for them.” Even after the formal split, cross-holdings remain.

As the conversation turns to the road ahead, the desserts arrive — a delicate berry cheesecake and a bowl of diced fruits. Nadir steps down as Chairman of Godrej Industries Group next year, when Pirojsha, currently the Executive Vice Chairperson, will take over. Adi’s daughter, Nisaba, is already the Chairperson of the FMCG business Godrej Consumer Products.

Nadir has three sons: Burjis, who is an executive director at Godrej Agrovet and Managing Director of Astec LifeSciences; Sohrab, who is in the US; and the youngest, Hormazd, who is part of the digital transformation team at Godrej Agrovet, building digital tools to improve decision-making across research, production and marketing. “We are quite interested in using AI in the R&D centres to do simulations and shorten experimentation time,” says Nadir.

The group has launched an internal Godrej AI Lab, led by Jyothirlatha B, CTO, Godrej Capital, to coordinate projects across companies.

As for the group’s future path, he is realistic about the pace. “Earlier, we used to grow about 20 per cent a year, but I think now it’s more likely to be about 10 per cent a year.” Among the businesses, he says, “Godrej Capital might grow very fast, and the oil palm business is likely to grow fast.”

When the question of legacy comes up, the answer lands exactly where the conversation began. “Perhaps to be remembered as a Renaissance man, and to make sure that the Godrej group continues on its way… maintains its values… one value that’s very important is innovation. That value will lead us to the future.”

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Published on November 10, 2025