Cars24 co-founder Gajendra Jangid has sparked a discussion online after sharing an observation about the number of entrepreneurs, business leaders and accomplished professionals he has encountered who hail from West Delhi.
In a post on X, Jangid said he kept "running into the same pin code - West Delhi", citing several people in his professional and personal circle who are from the area.
"A founder whose bars sit in my kitchen every morning West Delhi. The person leading GenAI at Cars24 West Delhi. The person who leads Product, West Delhi. The one who built our NBFC, West Delhi. Even my Gym trainer is from West Delhi. There are many more accomplished folks who around my circle who are from west delhi," Jangid wrote.
He said that he initially wondered whether he was simply experiencing selection bias, prompting him to look further into the phenomenon. "Then I started noticing it outside work," he wrote, pointing to cricketer Virat Kohli, who grew up in Uttam Nagar, former cricketer Virender Sehwag, who grew up in Najafgarh, and singer Neha Kakkar, who is also from Uttam Nagar.
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{{/usCountry}}Jangid then turned his attention to West Delhi's history and demographics. He pointed out that around 25 lakh people live across 129 square kilometres in West Delhi. He said that the area also has a long history of families building their lives and businesses from scratch after moving there following Partition in 1947.
He mentioned areas including Punjabi Bagh, Rajouri Garden, Patel Nagar, Kirti Nagar and Tilak Nagar, which became associated with families who had migrated to Delhi after Partition and rebuilt their lives from scratch.
"In those houses, business is not a career option you discuss once with a family. It is the background noise of the home. The shop is downstairs. Dinner is customers, credit, margins, the guy who still hasn't paid. A kid absorbs a P&L before he knows the word," Jangid wrote.
He also suggested that home ownership among many such families provided a degree of financial stability that could make it easier for younger people to take entrepreneurial risks. "And a lesser known thing. Most of those families own the house they live in. Not wealthy, but not fragile. That is exactly the floor a 25-year-old needs to say no to a safe job," he said.
"What did I miss West Delhi folks - what makes you so entrepreneurial? Or I am just hallucinating," he wrote.
He ended the post on a lighter note: "Also, somebody please tell me what exactly they put in that chole bhature."
What did social media say?
The post prompted several users to share their own explanations for what they see as West Delhi's entrepreneurial streak.
One user wrote, "Damn! Such an interesting observation. There's something about West Delhi ppl, they're showy & flamboyant, but they have this drive to get where they want to be. Honey Singh is frm west Delhi too..frm entrepreneurs to artists, west Delhi seems to breed unapologetically driven ppl."
"There are many people in West Delhi who came from elsewhere and built a life for themselves here. It's their zeal to grow, work hard, and build something meaningful that makes all the difference," commented another.
"from someone who spent his teens in west delhi. you either had money or you didn't. you do get exposed to seeing wealth in the area and that often leads to you wanting to hustle and get yourself out of trenches. i was just a 16 year old boy who needed money to spend with frnds," wrote a third user.
"I've seen the pattern too and glad someone articulated it well. I am from west Delhi and I feel what motivates those people to work hard (not only those in business but others who got into knowledge work) is reclaiming lost generational pride/wealth. Many Punjabis in west Delhi are folks from pre partition Punjab who lost all their wealth in 1947. I've heard stories of how my great grandparents used to have a lot of land in their name and had "made it" but lost it all. That trauma seems to have played a role in creating the ambition I've seen in many west Delhi folks," said another.