Deep Kalra, Vijay Shekhar Sharma And Me — The Runway To Success Mentoring Camp, Delhi 2013

In March 2013, TiE Delhi-NCR and Canaan Partners put together a very quiet, invitation-only mentoring camp called Runway to Success. On the mentor list that day were Deep Kalra of MakeMyTrip, Vijay Shekhar Sharma of Paytm, Saurabh Srivastava of TiE and the Indian Angel Network, Vivek Agarwal of Liqvid — and me. What I remember most about that day is not the audience. It is the friendships in the room.

Old Friends On The Same Stage

Deep Kalra and Saurabh Srivastava had been friends for years by the time this camp happened. The three of us moved in overlapping circles — we would run into each other at conferences, share green rooms, ride to venues together, share dinners on the road. TiE was the common thread. In those early-2010s years, TiE was where a certain generation of Indian founders found each other. Not through pitch decks or LP intros. Through simply being on the same stage, event after event, year after year.

So when the invitations for Runway to Success went out and I saw Deep's name and Saurabh's name on the list, it did not feel like a formal “mentor camp” to me. It felt like showing up to help friends run something meaningful for the next generation.

Why I Have Always Admired Deep Kalra

I want to say this plainly. Deep Kalra is one of the most straightforward, simple, no-nonsense founders I have shared a stage with. There is no performance in the man. He walks in as himself. He talks as himself. He builds MakeMyTrip the same way — clear-eyed, uncomplicated, no unnecessary drama. That kind of clarity is rare at any scale, and even rarer at his.

On the Runway to Success stage that day, Deep was, as always, extremely clear in his thoughts. He spoke in English, articulately, and the founders in the room listened with respect.

And Then It Was My Turn — In Hindi

When my turn came, I did what I have always done. I spoke in Hindi.

That decision, on a mixed-language stage in Delhi in 2013, was never a small one. Most of the other speakers around me on the Indian startup circuit spoke in English by default — polished, well-prepared English. My switch to Hindi always changed the room. Emotion showed up on stage in a way English simply could not carry for me. The founders in the audience — many of them from small-town India — leaned forward. They laughed at the right moments. They asked questions from the middle rows, not just the front two.

And there was another, quieter reason why my story landed particularly hard that day.

In 2013, Su-Kam Was Bigger In India Than MakeMyTrip

This is a piece of context that gets forgotten now, so let me say it clearly.

In 2013, MakeMyTrip was already a great brand — well-respected in metro cities, an early Indian internet success story. But it was not yet as widely known in small-town India as Su-Kam was. We had spent 15 years quietly building a dealer network into every corner of the country. In the small cities and the big cities, the ordinary Indian household knew Su-Kam. They had a Su-Kam inverter in the corner of their living room. They knew our sticker on their neighbourhood shop's wall.

So when I walked on stage that day and started telling the Su-Kam story in Hindi, I was not selling anyone on a company they had never heard of. I was talking about a brand many of them had grown up seeing on their own street. The audience was already emotionally connected before I opened my mouth. All I had to do was tell them how it was built.

“An English speech in a metro auditorium is a speech. A Hindi speech about a brand your audience grew up with is a conversation.”

What Made This Kind Of Circuit Special

People sometimes ask me now why I spent so many years travelling from city to city, doing these mentor camps and TiE conferences and college talks, when I could have been sitting inside the office running the business. The answer is simple: it was fun.

It was fun to be in a room full of people who cared about the same thing you cared about — building companies in India, the hard way. It was fun to share a stage with founders I genuinely liked and respected. It was fun to see young entrepreneurs' eyes light up when they realised that the path they were on had actually been walked, and survived, by people standing in front of them.

The Runway to Success camp in Delhi in March 2013 was one of those days. It was a room of first-time founders being told, without any polish, exactly what it takes. And it was made possible by TiE and Canaan Partners believing that mentorship — not just money — is what turns a good idea into a company.

The Line-Up, For The Record

For history's sake, this is the mentor bench Runway to Success 2013 walked out with:

• Deep Kalra — CEO & Co-Founder, MakeMyTrip
• Vijay Shekhar Sharma — MD, One97 Communications (Paytm)
• Saurabh Srivastava — Chairman Emeritus, TiE Delhi-NCR & Founder Member, Indian Angel Network
• Vivek Agarwal — CEO & Founder, Liqvid
• Kunwer Sachdev — Founder, Su-Kam Power Systems

Powered by Lufthansa, ET NOW, and Canaan Partners. Anchored by TiE Delhi-NCR and TiE Chennai.

About the Author

Kunwer Sachdev

Founder, Su-Kam Power Systems · The Inverter Man of India · The Solar Man of India

Startup mentor, angel investor and serial entrepreneur. Built Su-Kam from a Delhi component-supply business into a ₹1,200+ crore power-electronics brand across 70+ countries. Now mentors India's next generation of founders. Based in Gurgaon, Haryana.