There may be nothing much connecting the naïve 17-year old who left for Pune from his hometown in Kerala and the man who today heads the SRK Group, except perhaps for the tenuous thread of sheer will power that runs through his character. After all, he created a multi-core business empire from scratch and in a strange land. Mr K Rashid Malik, who got into the real estate sector 25years ago, is credited with developing more than 25 rural areas in Pune and Bangalore into sustainable Commercial Township.

Needless to say, this not only changed the facet of those areas but paved the way for more avenues of investment and employment in the area. “You need to have worked in many areas ,like legal, HR, Marketing, Accounts, Land Finance and Architecture, before you can have grip over real estate”, Malik once said in an interview to the Economic Times. “I have honed these skills through working 20 hours a day”. And all those hours have translated into over 2000 acres of projects and Malik is involved at every stage of the planning process of every project, right from conceptualization.

After transforming the look of metros like Pune and Bangalore, Rasheed is now raring to go in Kerala with projects scheduled for Cochin, Guruvayaoor, Thrissur, Thripunithura and Thiruvananthapuram. ”We do not believe in competition as our main focus would be to provide a custom-made habitat for elite,” said Malik.  We pioneered the idea of having Padmabhushan Dr K J Yesudas as our brand ambassador as our focus is on trust, good will and quality.

People were doubtful when I brought up the idea of a township, but it looks set to be a huge success.’ Malik who is powered by my energy, my dreams and my confidences”, does not believe in looking for benefits in everything he does. “But when I undertake a project, I know that taking it through to its completion is important,” he said. “The rest is up to God”.