Bichagadu Film Re-enacted In Hyderabad: Billionnaire’s Son lives For A Month Like Pauper

Hyderabad: Remember the film Bichagadu, where a millionaire lived a beggars’s life for a month? A similar thing took place in real life where a 23-year-old Gujarati boy, son of a diamond merchant who owns a Rs 6,000-crore company in Surat, lived a life in incognito in Hyderabad.

Hitarth Dholakia completed his Bachelors of Business Administration (BBA) from the New York University. As per the family tradition, anyone taking reins of the business have to conceal their identity and fend themselves a job on their own for a month. His father, Savji Dholakia gave Rs 500 to him. He was then told to head to Hyderabad.

On reaching the city, he stayed at a lodge in Secunderabd by paying Rs 100. The room was shared by others. As part of the challenge, Hitarth had to look for a job every week. The condition is that he cannot reveal his educational qualification to fetch a job. Recounting his struggles, he says, "I found a job at a food joint, which paid me Rs 4,000 a month. There I worked for five days and quit." He adds that it wasn’t easy to hunt for a job, but fortunately he got a marketing job in a manufacturing unit.

At last after the completion of his 30 days life in exile, his family landed in the city and was shocked to see the places where he lived in. His sister Krupali says, "I was shocked when we came to Hyderabad and visited the places where my brother lived and worked. It was a really tough job and a hard-to-believe situation for us, but I am proud of him and my family which is keeping this tradition alive to keep us grounded and to respect humans as well as the importance of money."

Hitarth's father made headlines in the past when he gifted his employees with flats and cars as bonus on the occasion of Diwali. Savji says that his family has been practicing this tradition of learning to put itself in the common man's shoes.