This is a small tribute to Mr Parag Parikh, a veteran investor in Indian equities.

He died in a car crash in Omaha, USA, where he had gone to attend the annual shareholder meeting of Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Corporation.

Spanning several decades, his investing career was a marvel of independence and of taking the difficult but more satisfying path. He had a very contrarian view and rather than jump into the waves of new sectors and new ideas, he chose stocks based on a conservative and solid understanding of the firms financials and prospects. His choices of investments always incorporated safe and ‘worst case scenario’ thinking, which allowed him to ride through the many crashes in Indian markets in the 80s and 90s. He thus built up a loyal following of investors.

His investing company’s business model switched from Broking to Portfolio Management, to Mutual Fund, over his career as he navigated India’s changing regulatory and investing landscape. His investors were happy to follow him through these changes.

I have personally gained from his advise when I met him in August 2014. He was generous enough to help me with his ideas for me to grow my small investment company.

He has written a book called ‘Value Investing and Behavioral Finance’ which is a fine collection of wisdom and lessons from his career.

RIP Mr Parag Parekh.