A Gujarati diamond merchant, Govind Dholakia brought around 1200 people (300 employees with family) on a 10-day trip to Uttarakhand. Dholakia seems to have taken the example of a few Chinese business tycoons who have been gifting all paid holidays to their employees. Dholakia owns the Surat and Mumbai-based Shree Ramkrishna Exports and has declared a 15-day holiday for his employees.
ToI reports that Dholakia had booked an all AC special train at the cost of RS 90 lakh to facilitate the tour to Uttarakhand for his workers. One of the employees of the Shree Ramakrishna exports told ToI that tiswas a part of a ‘yearly outing’ for all the employees. He also informed that Dholakia was referred to as ‘Kakaji’ by his employees. He said that the even last year they had been taken to Rishikesh during Diwali. He stated that Dholakia treats them as family members and travels with them. He also makes it a point to include the employees’ families in the holidays, which makes the experience more memorable, he added. It was reported by ToI that the group also does social work during their holidays. Thursday saw them cleaning the Swargasharm in Rishikesh with the help of the Nagar Panchayat, while Friday saw this group visiting the Sahastradhara Falls near Dehradun.
Manish Rajput, an associate of the Swargashram Nagar Panchayat told ToI that the group had been to the place on October 30 and had celebrated Diwali in Rishikesh. He said that the group had offered to clean the Ganga after meeting the panchayat chairperson Shakuntala Devi. He informed ToI that they had cleaned almost a 500-metre stretch. Dholakia was not available for comments. Some of his employees said that he did not like to publicise these activities.
