Nandan Nilekani Reveals His "Small Act Of Rebellion" Against Father

Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani has revealed that he joined IIT Bombay against his father's wishes. In a conversation with LinkedIn's global CEO Ryan Roslansky, Mr Nilekani said his father, who held an “insecure” job, wanted him to pursue a stable career path by studying at IIT Madras. But the entrepreneur had other plans. 

A significant figure in India's digital and economic transformation, Mr Nilekani said, “Well, you know, at 18 you are a rebel. So my father sent me a telegram that said ‘Join IIT Madras, chemical engineering.' I said, ‘I'm not going to listen to you.' I'll join electrical engineering at IIT Bombay.”

He added: “It was a small act of rebellion." 

Born in Bengaluru in the 1950s, he grew up when career options in India were limited to engineering or medicine. Since he had no interest in becoming a doctor, engineering seemed like the natural choice.

“If I wanted to do engineering, it had to be a good school, and IIT Bombay was the best school,” Mr Nilekani said.

He graduated with a degree in electrical engineering from IIT Bombay and started his career at Patni Computer Systems in Mumbai. There, he met NR Narayana Murthy, another key figure in the Indian IT industry, and they began discussing what their own company would look like. A few years later, Mr Nilekani, Mr Murthy, and five other engineers co-founded Infosys.

Mr Nilekani is also the visionary behind Aadhaar, the world's largest biometric ID system, serving over 1.3 billion people. Widely recognised for his transformative role in India's digital evolution, Mr Nilekani describes himself as an “accidental entrepreneur.” He never set out to build a global IT giant or lead one of the most ambitious public tech projects in history. Instead, curiosity was his guiding force. “I get up every morning wanting to learn new things,” Mr Nilekani said. “The future is about what only humans can do: empathy, compassion, and connecting the dots.”