A multifaceted personality, admired for multi-disciplinary talents – a writer, reader, traveler, socialist, an orator and engineer by profession and a humble philanthropist at the same time, he has donned many hats and excelled in all of them. His life experiences, wide reading and extensive networking contributed to his uniqueness.
Keeping faith in Gandhi’s credo, he is focusing on applying Gandhigiri* in modern times.
On August 19, 1975, Subash boarded his flight from Srinagar, Kashmir to Delhi. Just nine days earlier, he and Raj, a fine young Kashmiri lady born and raised in Pune, had got married. In the flight, he struck a conversation with his co-passenger, Dr Norman Dressel, the former Chairman of the Accounting at Georgia State University. This was the time when admission to a US university topped Subash’s mind. He had already received admission offers in MBA programs from Cornell University, two years deferred at Harvard and few others but none of them offered financial aid.
“Have you heard about Georgia State University (GSU)?” he asked. Subash hadn’t; a bit He was, more into the conversation and he started to India. H doubt his knowledge. Kanta, *An Indian neologism used to express the tenets of the philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi.
A brilliant student, armed with a BTech in Civil/Environmental Engineering from the prestigious IIT-Delhi in 1974, he was already working at Jay Engineering Works Limited as a management trainee.
“Do you know about the tallest hotel in the world?” Prof Dressel asked. “The Peachtree in Atlanta,” pat came his beaming answer. The two became close friends. Later, Prof Dressel arranged for GSU to offer him an admission… with financial aid to follow.
Treading the Right Path
On April 1, 1976, he landed in the US to fulfill his dream. “Staying away from family was a challenge. We were expecting our first child when I came to the US. I was in the mid of MBA and on a student visa. I met our son, Rahul, only when he was three-year-old – in 1979.” Meanwhile, Subash earned his MBA in Marketing and International Business in 1978 and started working at ES-Wilson Associates for $1000 a month – his first step into his career. “Until now, I had worked as a busboy, dishwasher and waiter in Atlanta.”
He was, however, leading a pampered life in India. His mother, a dedicated homemaker, Kanta, and his father, a hardworking successful central government employee, Prithvi Nath Razdan, brought him up to their best. “I am their only child so they spent all their energies and love on me. My father worked for the Ministry of Labor and Employment and frequently got transferred to a lot of cities. I was born in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, and spent most of my childhood in Delhi and Bombay though got a flavor of early education in Jabalpur, MP, too. My father retired as the Chief Labor Commissioner of India.”
He studied in Delhi Public School (Lajpat Nagar) and then at the prestigious St Columba’s School, both in Delhi. He vividly remembers playing marbles, tops and gilli danda and chasing kites with his friends. “My mother was a wonderful woman. She raised me with immense much love and care but was also a little strict when it came to studies, particularly when dad didn’t devote much time on it. One of my close friends and a neighbor, Sarabjit Singh, would come near our home and fly kite right outside and hand me the string inside my room as my mother thought I was busy studying (laughs).” Still best friends with Sarabjit, Subash feels blessed and fortunate to have such friends. “Ah, those memories!”
Polarized Interests United
During MBA, he was also a Graduate Research Associate in Quantitative Methods and Decision Sciences. He was an Adjunct Professor of Decision Sciences-Operations Research/ Quantitative Methods to BBA and MBA students at GSU for 20 years. He then had a stint in producing the popular Namaste Bombay, a local ethnic bilingual TV show on Asia Pacific Broadcasting Network (APBN) for over a couple of decades, while Raj produced and anchored it.
Raj was a key marketer of the superhit 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics. She had organized video shoots of diverse ethnic groups performing a dazzling parade in traditional costumes – a big tool in making a sales bidding-pitch by Atlanta for Olympics. Subash was the chosen Attache by the Indian government for Olympics and even served as an acting Chef-de-mission of the Indian contingent. He is the first and the only Indo-American to march at the opening ceremony alongside the flag bearer. “I was marching next to the hockey captain, Pargat Singh – a proud moment for sure.” Subash was also on the Mayor’s Olympics task force. All of it made him quit teaching, though.
Rough waters have come his way but with a sheer dint of perseverance and systematic planning, he built a successful career as a Civil-Environmental Engineering consultant with expertise in water and wastewater treatment, drainage/sewer system rehabilitation, water/ transport infrastructure, environmental studies, risk management, design and construction of treatment plants with Atlanta.
A People’s Man
He has served on various boards including the Georgia (State) Chamber of Commerce (GCC) and the International Partnership Committee (IPC) of Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce along with the International Consular Corp. He has served as an Advisor to the Coca Cola; Chairman of the Cobb County Economic/ Employment Commission; Governor of Georgia’s Census Count Committee, etc. In 1987, he and a colleague pioneered the refurbishing of the Gandhi Room at the King Center as the President of the Indian American Cultural Association (IACA).
He has been the President of the Asian-American Chamber of Commerce (AACC) of Georgia; Chairman and Co-Founder of The Gandhi Foundation, US. He has co-inspired the launch of and now flourishing The Gandhi-King Center at the Gandhigram Rural University, Tamil Nadu.
Subash, as the National President (1991–1998) of the National Federation of Indian American Associations, pioneered the installation of the Mahatma Gandhi Statue in Atlanta, the first of its kind in the US National Park at the MLK Historic Park. Raj is the Association’s President now.
He rubs shoulders with the top US political leaders and has accompanied President Bill Clinton for his maiden visit to India in 2000. He has been a regular guest at the White House.
Family = Fortune
Raj has been his utmost pride and his support system throughout his life. She postgraduated in geology and biology both. A benchwork researcher, she has worked at Emory University, CDC Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Onpoint Laboratory and Kennesaw State College and has many research publications to her credit. A benevolent social worker and public speaker, she now devotes her time to the Senior Citizens Program that she founded in 1996. She is the first women speaker on empowerment of women and children at BAPS temple. Through various associations, she supports and helps the victims of natural disasters in India and in the US. She was inducted as a Sister in Women’s Federation for World Peace and has served as Chairwoman for IACA Board of Directors in 1998.
She organized a sari-themed exhibition at the Marriott Marquis; a jewelry exhibition at the Atlanta International Museum; the first beauty pageant for the Indian American Cultural Association and many other fashion shows including one for the JC Penny Corp at the Atlanta Civic Center. She is a regular volunteer for Hands on Atlanta and Red Cross and other charitable organizations.
“She inspires me! The way she takes care of the people makes me realize that in this materialistic world, some people just need some love and affection. I am proud of her and her work.”
They have two very responsible and devoted sons, Rahul and Rishi; both are world renowned medical doctors and have trained as Interventional Radiologists from Yale in US.
Dr Rahul is married to Dr Petra Jonsson Razdan, MD (Swedish ancestry), an allergistimmunologist. They have three kids, Isabella Tamanna, Rafael Prithvi and Madeleine Lakshmi. Dr Rishi is married to Dr Breanna Bongiorno (Italian ancestry), a chiropractor. Their three children are Raegan Rishika, Rex Lalji and Ryla Gauri.
Subash admires and has befriended some of the yesteryear Bollywood actors, Raj Kapoor, Dev Anand, Kishore Kumar and Dilip Kumar and is currently hooked to Punyashlok Ahilyabai on TV and enjoys watching cricket.
Despite many awards and accolades and prized possessions, his public service where his interests run broad and deep is the formation of his being – probably the reason an entire city has dedicated a day on his name!