Not many takers for Birla HQ in Kolkata

KOLKATA: There is lot of empty space left in the 15th floor of the Birla Building, once considered as the global headquarters of the Birla empire, but it seems not many contenders interested to occupy that.The 15th floor of Birla Building is reserved for the Birla family members . However, now only S K Birla, the son of L N Birla, and B K Birla, the grandfather of Kumar Mangalam Birla and son of G D Birla, sit there regularly.

C K Birla, the son of G P Birla, and Siddharth Birla, the son of S K Birla, sit on the 15th floor occasionally as they have shifted base to Delhi.

Kumar Mangalam sat in his office on 15th floor only for a few days in the last 10 years. The latest addition in the list will be Chandra Sekhar No-pany , the son in law of K K Birla and son of Nandini Nopany. Interestingly, Birla Building apparently has 16 floors in number but ac-tually it has 14 floors. Neither there is a ground floor and nor 12th floor in the iconic Birla headquarters. The building starts with 1st floor.

S K Birla told TOI that they are open to allow the family of the daughters to sit on 15th floor. “What to do, there are not many Birlas now in Kolkata . Only me and Basant Kumar (B K) Birla sit at 15th floor. The time has come that the family of the daughters, too, occupy space at the floor,” he said.

He pointed out that Saroj Poddar, the son in law of K K Birla, was also offered space at the 15th floor but he was not interested. Saroj Poddar in-herited Texmaco and Zuari Industries. “We have first offered space to Sa-roj Poddar but he has a big office . Lot of his offices are outside the Birla Building. So it was difficult for him. But in case of Nopany, it was easy. Most of his offices are in Birla Building only,” he added. S K Birla recalled that in the hey days, as many as 10 Birla family mem-bers used to sit on the 15th floor. G D Birla, B M Birla, L N Birla, M P Birla, K K Birla, B K Birla, G P Birla, S K Birla, Aditya Birla, C K Birla, Siddharth Birla used to sit on the 15th floor in the 70s.