Premjeet
Sodhi
Senior vice president
Intellect
Lintas Media Group BY:
CHIKITA KUKREJA
 It
has been a rollercoaster ride for Premjeet
Sodhi, Sr. Vice President, Intellect, Lintas
Media Group. He welcomes change and has
experimented with many different roles along
the way. Some have clicked, whilst others
failed. Here, Premjeet takes us through
the maze that he calls life.
"Born
in Nagpur, Premjeet has fond memories of
being beating up by his sister and elder
brother. "I even remember the days
when my brother would return after giving
an exam and sit with my mother to discuss
his paper and she would always turn to me
and ask, 'are you going to pass?' I have
always been an average student throughout
my life."
"With
my father working in the bank, our childhood
has seen many transfers to various places.
I completed my electronic engineering from
RKN engineering college in Nagpur. Just
as most youngsters my age, I too harboured
a desire to go to the United States for
further studies. To boost my chances,I knew
that experience in teaching would be an
advantage. So, I became a lecturer at RKN
engineering college.
I've
made a few wrong moves in life
"My first visit to Mumbai was for my
US visa, and I left the dream of going abroad
far behind when my visa was rejected. Later,
I sat for the competitive exams and cleared
quite a few of them and finally got into
IRMA (Institute of Rural Management Anand).
After completing my management from there,
I joined Gujarat State Financial Service
at Ahmedabad. But, on realizing that it
was too risky a business as the burden of
any default would come on me, I decided
to opt out of it. Then was the time to do
a SWOT analysis and I found that my analytical
skills were my biggest strength," says
Premjeet.
"So,
choosing marketing research as a favourable
field, I moved to Mudra Advertising as an
associate project director in the ICRG branch
for two and a half years. I found no scope
for growth in Ahmedabad and therefore moved
to Mumbai in 2000."
"Here,
I joined hands with MRUC and worked with
great names in the industry like Roda Mehta,
among many others. I was later guided by
some senior friends of mine who told me
that I was fit for rural media, so I applied
to O&M and Lintas and luckily got through
both interviews, but ultimately joined O&M."
"New
enterprises always charmed me and the dot com boom caught my fancy. I joined Tangent
Software Pvt Ltd. But the company wound up in no time and I was without a job.
At this point, I took complete time off from work and just did nothing for a couple
of months.
I
returned to MRUC as a consultant and later
became the Technical Manager. In 2002, I
joined Lintas Media under Partho Ghosh,
though I did not get to work much with him.
But thereafter, Lynn de Souza has been my
driving force. She has been an extremely
good guide and philosopher and has helped
me gain a completely new perspective.
Mine
was an arranged marriage
My wife Simran, a dentist had come down
from Amritsar to Mumbai to be with her relatives.
It took us only 15 minutes in our first
meeting to decide that we want to spend
our lives together. Since my marriage, life
has been great with my wife and my three-and-a-half-year-old
son, Rajveer.
 I
was absolutely numb when Rajveer was brought
to me
No one can really prepare you for the day
you become a father. There is a strange
feeling of numbness and all that you can
do is just wait and watch. When I held Rajveer
for the first time, I was aghast! I really
did not know what to do. And, nowadays,
all that I hear from Simran is, 'you don't
love me, you only love Rajveer.'
I
surprised my wife with a trip to Goa
I've have been slogging away and have not really been able to take off for any
planned holidays. Last year in September, I took Simran for a holiday to Goa as
she has not seen much of the West. One day prior to her birthday, I asked her
to just pack her bags as we were off to celebrate her birthday in Goa.
Though we go to Punjab quite often, we hardly
get time to go anywhere else. My trips abroad
have been to London, New York and California.
The best place to see was Las Vegas and
the Grand Canyon.
 As
such, I don't have a dream destination,
but I do wish to undertake a voyage to Darjeeling,
Imphal, Kerala and the Himalayas some day.
I
don't miss my wife as far as food is concerned
I am a typical Punjabi when it comes to
my appetite. I am game for any kind of cuisine.
But, yes, I am biased to non-vegetarian
food. Staying alone for 6 to 7 years, I
had even started experimenting in the kitchen
and seeing the time consumed, I started
channelising all the effort in making non-vegetarian
dishes. I am a pretty good cook, so much
so that my wife leaves making some dishes
entirely to me. I love Chicken Mumtaz, which
I make following recipe books. Otherwise,
Tariwalla chicken, chawal and rajma chawal
are my favourite dishes.
Other
than that, I once went for a light Chinese meal of Dimsums, which one can eat
unlimited. I remember this meal as the food was awesome.
I
read only when traveling
Reading is part of my profession and I keep
up with it. I hardly read one or two books
in a year. Presently I am reading The
World is Flat and Freakonomics.
Sundays
were reserved for early morning movies with my son
I am fond of English romantic movies which
include, A Walk in the Clouds and
One Fine Day, among others. There
were days when I used to take my son for
movies every Sunday morning and it used
to be great fun watching him getting ready
in the morning, all excited.
 I
am a cautious shopper
I am an essential part of any shopping routine,
purely to hold the bags. I am a reformed
husband now. With time, I have learnt to
like shopping. I value need and don't go
in for anything which is not necessary.
I mostly prefer branded stuff.
Hidden
secrets
I love photography and sketching to a great
extent. The last sketch I made was of my
wife and my son, when my son was very young.
I used to play the violin when I was young,
but its been over 10 years since I even
touched the instrument.
I
always wanted to learn different languages
and my dad's transferable job helped me
in that. Urdu is one language I want to
learn at length. I wish to read my dad's
Ghalib collection.
Something
that makes me go green with envy is the
word "Dr" that precedes Simran's
name. So, it is my dream to do a PHD in
communication and have the "Dr"
tag too.
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