We’d gone to meet the soul of NAMCO Hospital, Shashikant Parakh. He was in a meeting regarding the construction of a Bone Marrow Transplant unit at the hospital.
Photo with Shashikant Parakh
I got to hear a few bits and pieces of it. Shashikant, a commerce graduate, was talking with no less depth of knowledge than a medical professional. He talked loud and clear, and never ever drifted away from the topic. A management authority, who himself was a doctor, showed us around the hospital.
The hospital was different from other hospitals in many ways. It didn’t have the hospital smell. Instead, it smelled of respect for Shashikant. Its cleanliness was striking and the equipment could’ve easily put to shame the finest of super speciality hospitals. All this for patients who cannot pay for their treatment. All this because of one man — Shashikant.
“I was born and brought up in the religious town of Shirdi, the town of Sai Baba. We were a joint family and owned a small shop of religious goods in front of a temple.”
Shirdi was, and still is, the destination of pilgrims. But the thing is that the pilgrims don’t come to visit Shirdi only. There’s a chain of destinations ahead, which is why most of the pilgrims don’t stay in Shirdi for more than half a day. This was a brilliant opportunity to develop a lodging business and it took an innovative young chap, like Shashikant, to recognise this.
“There was a 34-room lodging apartment to be rented in Shirdi. I convinced my family to pay the rent and said I would handle the business. They agreed.”
Shashikant started the hotel in three eight-hour shifts. Since the pilgrims didn’t need to stay for the whole day, they preferred Shashikant’s hotel over others. Immediately, it was a huge success.
“The rent was ₹1,11,000 per year, and I managed to earn a sum of 7-8 lakhs in the first year. I was in my first year of college.”
Soon, he’d earned enough to buy another hotel, and soon after, a third one. The business had settled without facing any serious challenges. But was he settled?
No! A smooth ride isn’t his type. He likes a roller coaster filled with challenges.
“Once the lodging business had settled, I handed it over to my family and said, ‘You take care of this business and I, am going to Nashik.’”
He came to Nashik with no riches and no recognition. He would need to build it again. Soon, he started a distribution agency. Once it had settled, he ventured into real estate. Then construction, and then, warehousing. Today, in total, he runs eight businesses, with an annual total turnover of more than a hundred crores, and employs about a hundred people.
“Opportunities kept on coming, and I kept on grabbing them.”
But a nagging question haunted him: is there an end to all this? And if there’s no end, then why expand the business? He stopped expanding it around 2008-09. Now, it was time to use his entrepreneurial skills to help others. That was the biggest challenge.
“I volunteered at a few places before I was given the opportunity to work at NAMCO charitable hospital.”
When I joined, NAMCO was totally deteriorated. The first day after he joined, he called a ‘staff meeting.’
“I said to them, ‘I’m the new secretary here and we are going to transform NAMCO.’ They laughed. They literally laughed and said, ‘We’ve seen a lot of people like you. You just jabber and do nothing.’”
When I joined, NAMCO was only treating cancer patients. Bats and rats roamed around. There were only two doctors, both of whom weren’t present most of the time. We had thirty beds, out of which, at maximum, only three were occupied.
This was 2015. Fast forward to 2020, and you’ll see an entirely different picture.
“Today, NAMCO is a multi-specialty hospital en route to becoming a super-specialty hospital with state-of-the-art technology at the cheapest rates. There is a staff of 305, out of which, 40 are highly qualified medical professionals. It now has a total of a hundred beds with a few patients always in the waiting.”
Still, Shashikant’s ambitions for NAMCO run quite high, quite literally.
“I’m going to construct a twelve-storey tower with each floor dedicated to each specialty,” he says nonchalantly.
Shashikant’s entire life has revolved around one word: challenges. He loves taking up challenges; he thrives when challenged. His life will continue to revolve around that word. He had taken up the biggest challenge of helping others, but he has a wish for a personal challenge as well: Skydiving.
“Skydiving is a dream. I couldn’t do it before, but I will do it soon.”
It will not be a surprise then, if he takes a jump out of his steady flight, to take up an entirely new challenge, falling fast towards the destination, with sheer determination to glide to safety.
Advice to the Youth
“Dream big. It’s as simple as that. Ever since my childhood days, I’ve always dreamt of becoming the richest man of my town. Dream big but dream with intensity. Only those dreams come true.”
“Keep learning. Be ready to learn. I’ve always had this mindset — whichever field I’ll dabble in, I’ll gain complete knowledge of it. When I started in real estate, I went through a lot of books. When I started working at NAMCO, I studied medical books, which I still do. Have that mindset.”
“And be happy. Success is nothing but happiness. Don’t complain. Do whatever you want but be happy.”