It was a deal that involved the Raymond Group’s cement business being sold to the French player Lafarge. Akshay Chudasama was then the attorney representing textile house Raymond with Zia Mody on the opposite side for Lafarge. “There’s many moving parts and multiple conditions precedent when a big deal is being done and the whole journey was working up to this point where the money gets wired and shares consequently get transferred,” he remembers. “I was trying to close the deal, and everything had to take place simultaneously. Zia Mody was on the opposite side for Lafarge, and there was a stipulated period of time when everything had to take place simultaneously. At one point, the shares had been transferred, and the money hadn’t yet been wired. So everybody’s on tenterhooks, with the management shouting, and screaming, and I’m at Zia’s office to chase the matter down. Eventually she got so fed up with me, she locked herself up in her room and wouldn’t come out.”
