After years of press coverage, Gupta knows well the media’s tendency to overstate things, and downplays the role of music in his life.
A $100 MP3 player with his favourite music was former McKinsey MD Rajat Gupta’s companion during his time in jail.
In an elegant antechamber at Mumbai’s Walchand Hirachand Hall, Rajat Gupta sips watermelon juice and wishes he had worn his other jacket.
“It had my little MP3 player, on which I would listen to music in prison. I would have shown you what music there is on it,” he says, his voice hoarse, and the face a mix of a strong jawline and porcelain features.
Old Hindi film songs, some rock and roll and opera, bhajans and Sanskrit shlokas helped Gupta, the former McKinsey chief arrested for insider trading, handle the ordeal of prison life. He spent about a year-and-a-half at the FMC Devens correctional facility in Massachusetts from June 2014 to early 2016.
“You could buy that [an MP3] in prison for about $100, which is ridiculous,” Gupta says. “In prison, everything is expensive. You could download songs at about a $1.50 per song. I would walk around the place. I listened to a lot of Sanskrit shlokas, the Gayatri mantra, the Mahamrityunjaya mantra, songs from 'Anand', Lata Mangeshkar… the whole gamut.”
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The youngest of Gupta’s four daughters, Deepali, is a musician. At times she would send him recommendations in new music. But, in general, his taste is classic. “I love listening to [Luciano] Pavarotti and 'The Beatles' or 'The Eagles',” Gupta says.
After years of press coverage, Gupta knows well the media’s tendency to overstate things, and downplays the role of music in his life.
“I’m not that much into music. I listen to music like anybody does, you know?”
While Indian cinema is represented in Gupta’s playlist, the other Indian obsession — cricket — is not something he watches much. He goes for the US Open tennis tournament in New York often. “I have also grown to like basketball and American football,” he says.
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Asked if he supports the New York teams, whose failures are often joke punchlines, Gupta says, “[They are] Not very good right now.”
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Ron Gutman And Other CEOs Who Were Fired For Their Toxic Leadership
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