"I Was 18 Or 19...": Zerodha's Nikhil Kamath Recounts 1st Trip Abroad During Call Centre Days

Zerodha co-founder Nikhil Kamath recently revealed that his first trip abroad, which took place in the early 2000s, was to the United Kingdom when he was a call centre employee. Speaking on the 'WTF is Banglore' YouTube show, Mr Kamath said that his maiden international journey marked a significant moment in his life. He disclosed he was 18 or 19 at the time and didn't own a passport before that trip. 

"I was 18 or 19, they [the call centre] sent me to London to work with the client, the vendor Stonebridge. Stonebridge is part of a larger insurance company called Aegon. I didn't have a passport, I had to make a passport. Went to London, along with five other colleagues of mine," Mr Kamath said.

"It was good fun. They used to pay us well. They'd give us an allowance of 50 pounds a day, which for somebody who earns Rs 10,000-15,000 salary at that point when I was 19, that's Rs 4,000-5,000 bucks a day," he added. 

For Mr Kamath, the trip was more than just a means of earning extra income. "London meant even more because back then it was such a thing that it was much-needed validation," he said. 

Further, the Zerodha co-founder revealed that this was also the time he started trading in the stock market, a domain that later shaped his successful career and turned him into a billionaire. 

"So, did call centre, started trading at the same time when I was 17. By trading, I don't mean some big thing. It's like in Rs 8,000 rupees, you have Rs 2,000 that you can save. Take that money and buy something sell something. Share Khan used to be around back then; I still remember I had a Share Khan account," he recalled. 

"So by the time I was 19, 20 [years old], salary had gone up to Rs 20,000-30,000, which felt like a lot back in the day. I would tell myself: 'See, a doctor is only earning Rs 15,000, you're in a call centre, you're earning Rs 25,000 and feel very good about it'," Mr Kamath said. "So, for a while I did both. I worked call centres in the night, I did trading in the morning," he added. 

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In the YouTube show, Mr Kamath also went on to mention his plans to enhance Bengaluru's appeal by planting cherry blossom trees. I have a group of friends, who are like total Bangaloreans. We all catch up once in a while and we figure out how to make Bangalore even cooler. There's like seven, eight of us and we're constantly working on projects to 'how do we make Bangalore cooler in actual and cooler from a narrative standpoint?' So, we are planning to plant 10,000 [cherry blossom] trees in Bangalore," he said.