F.C. Kohli on Infrastructure Building

After MIT, Kohli trained in power system operations at Ebasco International, the Connecticut Valley Power Exchange and New England Power Systems before returning to India in 1951 to join Tata Electric Company, where he set up a load dispatching system — an early instance of applying Western utility-grade engineering practice to Indian infrastructure.

At Tata Electric, Kohli became a general superintendent in 1963 and deputy general manager in 1967, and introduced the use of digital computers for power system design and control — including the CDC 3600 mainframe at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research — making Tata Electric one of the first utility companies anywhere to deploy computers for grid management.

At Tata Hydro-Electric, Kohli oversaw systems operations for power distribution and, by 1968, made Tata Electric one of the first companies anywhere to use a computer to control the power grid — a utility-side innovation that the article positions as the immediate precursor to TCS, which he and J.R.D. Tata set up within two years.

To produce the talent TCS needed, Kohli promoted the new Indian Institutes of Technology created by Jawaharlal Nehru, both finding teaching staff for them and teaching some courses himself — a deliberate pipeline-building strategy that linked the company's growth to the expansion of the country's technical-education capacity.

The Hindu notes Kohli joined Tata Electric Co. in 1951 and helped set up its load despatching system, becoming a director of Tata Electric in 1970 — utility-side experience that directly preceded his pivot to building TCS as a software-services vehicle for the Tata Group and the country.