Lucky makes gauze for the whole country

Ramani KANGARAARACHCHI

When starting a small business the trend in Sri Lanka is copying the same business of his neighbour instead of innovating one.

But those who go for rare or uncommon business ideas can sustain in a less competitive market for a long time. Kishani Industries Chairman Lucky Heendeniya, a manufacturer of surgical gauze required for government hospitals in the country for the last 30 years is a person who believed in creative ideas.

He was interviewed by Daily News Business for Biz Bud column this week. Excerpts from the interview.

Q: What is your background before starting this business?

After completing my Advanced Level at St Joseph's College, Nugegoda my father sent me to the College of Fine Arts with a view to obtain a teaching appointment which was a possibility those days. But at the end of first year the government said that teaching appointments cannot be given to all the graduates. Then I gave it up and became a medical representative at Phillips Duphar company of Holland.

Q: What happened after that?

In the meantime my father started a company to import thread and he wanted me to support the business. So I joined him. I got married after some time and was blessed with a baby girl in 1967 and she was named Kishani. We got a lot of gift boxes for her and I realised some of them were worthless. Then the idea of designing a good baby nappy suitable to give as a gift came to my mind. I approached a Director at Libra Industries Sohli Captain who manufactured bandage cloth. He kindly agreed to help me by giving Rs 500 worth of bandage cloth. I found that initial investment by selling the gift packs received for our daughter. I and my wife worked hard day and night to design and introduce the new nappy to the market. The gift box with three nappies with blue and pink lines came out nicely and it was named as Kishani Luxury Baby Nappies.

Through my influences as a medical rep, I was able to find the market for the new product and it became popular very soon.

Later I decided to manufacture my own bandage cloth and one of my uncles, the owner of Ramani Industries helped me to establish with four handlooms installed in a cadjan shed behind my house.

One Mr Raju at the Wellawatta Spinning Mill helped me to manufacture a few metres of surgical gauze material and it was equivalent to British Pharmacopia standard.

As a medical rep I realized that surgical gauze is more profitable than the nappies and decided to expand the industry and Kishani Industries was established in Minuwangoda. The company progressed well and I was asked to manufacture surgical gauze required for the government hospitals. But unfortunately I could not get the yarn quota required then due to various reasons. I gave an interview to the media about this problem and after that I was called immediately by the Planning Ministry and as a result I got the first order to supply 500,000 metres of surgical gauze to the Health Ministry.

Despite many challenges I was able to open factories in Pannala, Keragala, Udakanampella, Homagama and Seeduwa during 1978 and 1988.

The country became self sufficient with 28 manufacturers of surgical gauze during this time and the import of surgical gauze was banned thereafter.

My quota was 2000,000 metres at this time and it was my full capacity. The country was able to save a lot of foreign exchange as a result of manufacturing 14.5 million metres of surgical gauze locally.

Q: What are the challenges you have faced in this journey?

There are so many. I will tell some of them. People who wanted to import gauze and get the commission were not happy with me and they were upto many malpractices.

This problem was aggravated as there was no co-ordination between the relevant ministries. I always protested and was able to protect the industry at every time.

During the height of the JVP insurrection I was left with a note asking to close all my factories. But I put up a permanent poster opposite all my factories giving reasons why I should not close them and continued work. However I had to close down all factories when the raw material was over at the end of that year.

Finally I had to import raw material at a high cost and I had to mortgage company premises facing severe financial crisis.

Q: What are your significant achievements during this period?

I cultivated honesty and hard work all my life and was able to do many things for the country.

I was the first to introduce readymade baby nappies to the local market and I pioneered the surgical gauze industry, and initiated a number of improvements in the industry such as changing construction of surgical gauze to match the imported gauze, introducing red thread to prevent pilferage,and profit sharing with workers.

I was also one of the ten outstanding persons for the progress and development of business and industrial enterprises in the country in 1981.

Q: What are your future plans?

I am planning to enter the export market with value addition to our product. We are getting new machines from China for this purpose.

Then we can manufacture sterilized gauze cut according to the requirement in the future.