TRAILER — How Bharti Airtel Refused to Die | Intermission E03 | The Ken

On 12 August 2026, N Chandrasekaran, the TCS intern who became the first non-Parsi chairman of Tata Sons, said he was done. He wouldn't seek another term. Five weeks later, the board brought him back. On 17 September, it voted to reappoint him for five more years, starting in February 2027. Noel Tata's Tata Trusts, the majority shareholder, calls the vote illegal. Tata Sons says it followed the rules. Shareholders still have to approve it at an AGM due by 31 December, and this could end up in court. That chair matters because of the company that produced him. From 2000 to 2026, TCS supplied close to 80% of Tata Sons' dividend and buyback income, roughly Rs 2.7 lakh crore. That money has paid for almost every big Tata bet you can name, from Air India to semiconductors. TCS was never meant to be this. It began in 1962 as an in-house unit to centralise the group's data processing, and Tata companies refused to hand over the work. To survive, it had to navigate the License Raj, when computers were taxed like toasters, and a 1978 attempt by its own parent to fold it into a joint venture with Burroughs. Along the way, it stumbled into the model that built India's IT industry: build in India, deliver to the world. Its tools helped build institutions like the National Stock Exchange. It worked through hundreds of millions of lines of Y2K code. And it turned small-town graduates into a global professional class. Now AI, a $100,000 H-1B fee, and the rise of GCCs are threatening the pyramid TCS was built on. This is the story of two small communities, the Tamil Brahmins and the Parsis, and the company that built India’s IT export industry and bankrolled the Tatas. Now it has to save itself. Tune in! ---------

Ask most Indians which IT company their parents wanted them to join, and they'll say Infosys or Wipro. Yet it was TCS that quietly became India's biggest software company, and the engine behind the entire Tata empire. The story goes all the way back to 1968, to a data-processing unit inside Tata Sons that the group's own companies didn't want to work with. It follows TCS as it stumbled into inventing India's IT outsourcing industry, helped carry the world through Y2K, and came to fund almost every big Tata bet, while the boardroom above it fought over who should run the show. The question at its heart: can a company that sold human intelligence to the world survive the age of artificial intelligence? Episode 5 of Intermission on TCS goes live on Thursday, 1 October.

ITC is the great paradox of Indian business: a tobacco company that spent decades trying to become something other than a tobacco company, and pulled it off. Getting there meant surviving a tax demand five times its net worth, the arrest of two former chairmen, and a long, bruising war with BAT for control of the company. It meant winning at atta when even Hindustan Unilever couldn't, rewiring how India's farmers sell their crops, and building it all without a founder or a family at the helm. Today ITC turns over roughly ₹80,000 crore, owns a ₹9,000 crore brand in Aashirvaad alone, and counts the Indian government as its single largest shareholder. Among them, LIC, which insures the lives of the very smokers keeping ITC's profits alight. This is the story of how a colonial cigarette company became one of India's most valuable — and most unlikely — conglomerates. Tune in! --------- We also have an interactive companion page to explore the history of ITC with reading lists, infographics and source notes: https://the-ken.com/intermission/the-fmcg-company-in-a-cigarette-pack-itc/ ---------- Credits: Hosts: Rohin Dharmakumar, Seetharaman G Podcast Producer: Vidhatri Rao Director: Vijay Subramaniam Video Producer: Vishnu S Sound Design and Technical Producer: Rajiv CN Lead Researcher: Raghav Batra Art Direction: Kavipriya OG Data Visualisation: Anuj Debnath Production Agency: Nesara Films Creative Direction: Sunayana Kashyap DoP: Subash KP Animation:⁠⁠ Karthik N Video Editing Team: Spandan Joshi, Prajwal Colourist: Akhil Raj Graphic Design and Styleframes: Anusha Sarah On-Set Production: Veeresh and team Production Coordination: Kevin Raj Audio: ⁠⁠Murthy and team Spot Edit: Girish Set Design: Saanvi Joshi, Thejaswini Promotions: Pranav Pate, Adhavan RK Writer (Microsite): Brady Ng Editor: Sumit Chakraborty Product Design (Microsite): Praveen Gopal Krishnan, Ritika Sanikere, Sushmita Vavilala, Karan Kumar 'Intermission' Title Track by Sameer Rahat ---------- About Intermission: Intermission dives into the histories of iconic Indian companies. It was produced with vital support and assistance from Zerodha, our sponsor for season 1. Disclosure: Zerodha’s perennial fund, Rainmatter Capital, is an investor in The Ken. About The Ken: The Ken is India’s first subscriber-only business journalism platform reporting on business, technology, and startups in India. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://the-ken.com⁠⁠⁠⁠ and explore our stories, newsletters, podcasts and more. Follow The Ken on socials: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theken_web/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-ken/ Twitter: http://x.com/thekenweb/

Ask two generations of Indians what ITC is, and you'll get two completely different answers. That gap might be one of the most remarkable reinventions in Indian business. The story goes all the way back to 1910 — to a British tobacco company that taught India how to smoke — and follows ITC's journey into food, paper, hotels and agri, all without a founding family, and with more boardroom drama than most thrillers. The question at its heart: how does a company build a future beyond tobacco? Episode 4 of Intermission on ITC goes live on Monday, 17 August.

Stream a video, send a message, call a loved one. For nearly 474 million Indians, that connection runs through Bharti Airtel.