Ambition fuels giving
DURBAN businesswoman Kajal Panday, pictured, is one of the wholesalers of diesel on the North Coast. The 32-year-old mother of two broke into the highly competitive male-dominated field of supplying diesel and petroleum products to distributors who operate in one of the toughest terrains of KwaZuluNatal.
“It is exciting work and it calls for decision-making often running into six figures while on the move. If time is money then the diesel industry puts you into perspective.
“I started a few years ago and now I have most of the distributors who supply the most rural of areas on the North Coast who no longer regard me as an intrusion into an all-man world,” she said.
Panday who holds a Master of Business Administration degree, said her formal education gave her an edge over some of her competitors.
“It calls for a very clear head, for example when it comes to defining the difference between goals and ambitions.”
Panday plays a leading role in the development of girls in a number of African countries, especially in Sudan.
“I was horrified when I found out that teenage girls were being married off to far older men who often ill-treated and abused them.
“Many of them managed to escape, but then were confronted by poverty and often lived on a diet of flour mixed with sand. This broke my heart and now there is an organisation which has gathered large numbers of these girls and is getting them back into mainstream society,” said Panday.
She said girls around the world were discriminated against and subjected to the most horrific cruelties.
“We have to stamp out the practice of child brides on the African continent. In this day and age, one would expect that the international human rights organisations would do something about it.” She said education was the key to a bright future and every effort must be made to make sure girls got the best possible education.
“No longer does a simple university degree do, especially in the future. We must encourage governments to provide 20 years of free education right up to Master’s level. Getting their doctorates should not be too difficult, but in the process, we would have changed he intellectual mindset of the people of Africa.
“It was my mother who groomed me throughout my formative years. It was her wisdom and inspiration that got me to develop a vision of who I should be in my adult life. I am most grateful to my mother.”
Panday joined Tiger Brands as an intern after completing her degree. She then landed the post of global operations manager for a multinational corporation that has its head office in Chicago.
She left her job to start a family and once that she had her two boys, she decided to launch her own operation.
While she does “nicely” in balancing her business and private lives, she insists she has to touch the lives of those who are downtrodden.
She is the ambassador of the Empress Indian South Africa Pageant where her task is to headhunt women in business to be trained as motivational speakers and to host leadership development programmes.
She is also working with a worldwide network to provide a sanctuary for girls who have been rescued from human traffickers.