Mahashay Dharampal Gulati, MDH owner, passes away at 98

Mahashay Dharampal Gulati, the owner of the iconic spice brand MDH- Mahashian Di Hatti passed away on December 3, 2020. The king of spices was 98.

He was admitted to a hospital in Delhi and was reportedly undergoing treatment for the past few weeks. He suffered a cardiac arrest on the morning of December 3.

Fondly called as ‘dadaji’ or ‘Mahashayji’, he started from his shop in Karol Bagh and went on to build MDH in one of the leading spices manufacturers of India. In 2019, he received Padma Bhushan from President Ram Nath Kovind.

Dharampal Gulati was also India’s highest-paid consumer product CEO for 2017 during which he took home over Rs. 21 crores as a salary. He outearned celebrities such as Vivek Gambhir and Adi Godrej of Godrej Consumer, YC Deveshwar of ITC, and Sanjiv Mehta of Hindustan Unilever.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Deputy CM Manish Sisodia paid their condolences on the demise of Dharampal Gulati. through Twitter. 

Dharm Pal ji was very inspiring personality. He dedicated his life for the society. God bless his soul. https://t.co/gORaAi3nD9

— Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) December 3, 2020

Creation of the MDH empire:

• MDH was started by Dharampal Gulati’s father Chunni Lal in 1919 as a small shop in Pakistan.

• After the partition, late Gulati moved to a shop in Karol Bagh, Delhi, and further opened 15 factories supplying 1000 dealers in India.

• MDH now has a sprawling business empire of Rs. 1,500 crores which run the masala company, hospital, and the number of schools.

• MDH also has a number of overseas offices in London and Dubai and the company also exports its products to over 100 countries.

• The overall operations of the company are managed by Gulati’s son while his six daughters handle the region-wise distribution.

• The spice manufacturer has over 60 products and gets the majority of sales from three variants- Deggi Mirch, Chat Masala, and Channa Masala. Reportedly, each of these products sells over crore packets every month.

Dharampal Gulati: Personal Life

He was born in Sialkot, Pakistan and his family migrated to India during the partition. They spent some time in a refugee camp in Amritsar before they settled in Delhi. Gulati was a fifth- grade dropout.

In 1937, with his father’s help he had set up a small business of looking mirrors and after that soap business and carpentry job, cloth merchant and then hardware business and rice trading.

He also used to donate 90% of his salary to the charity under Mahashay Chunni Lal Charitable Trust. It operates a hospital with 250 beds in Delhi, along with a mobile hospital with slum dwellers and 4 schools.