Govind Dholakia left his village in Gujarat and arrived in Surat in 1964 with no degree, no English, and almost no money in his pocket. He came with only the determination to find work, learn a skill, and build a life in a city where opportunity existed for those willing to work for it. The empire he went on to build — Shree Ramkrishna Exports (SRK), a ₹8,000+ crore diamond company — began with that single decision to arrive and persist.
Govind Dholakia began his working life in Surat as a diamond cutter, earning just ₹100 per month and spending every available hour learning the craft of cutting and polishing rough stones. The close, detailed work of transforming an unpolished rough stone into a brilliant finished diamond required patience, precision, and a steady hand — qualities that defined how he would approach everything he built later. Those early months of learning at a workbench, earning barely enough to survive, were the foundation on which one of India\'s great business stories was constructed.
Shree Ramkrishna Exports today is one of the most respected diamond companies in the world, with revenues that have crossed ₹13,000 crore at peak and a workforce of thousands of skilled artisans working across modern manufacturing facilities. The factory floor — a space Govind Dholakia himself once occupied as a daily wage worker — now employs thousands of people who earn stable livelihoods because of what one man refused to give up on. The scale of what was built from a ₹100 monthly wage remains one of the most extraordinary examples of self-made success in Indian business history.
The SRK Empire office complex in Surat is both the operational headquarters of one of India\'s top diamond companies and a monument to how much is possible without formal credentials or initial capital. Govind Dholakia went on to become a Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha and one of Gujarat\'s most celebrated philanthropists, funding schools, hospitals, and water conservation projects across Saurashtra. His words — I am nothing, but I can do anything — carry weight precisely because he proved them true over six decades of determined effort.