Recollects Managing Director of Hotel Surya palace, Piyush Shah,``It all began when my grandfather Ramjidas and father Daudayal migrated from Mathura.'' Three people from Mathura, including Duliram Pendawala, who had settled in the city, lend financial help to the Shahs to set up a milk shop. ``My elder brother Daudayalji fetched milk on bicycle from nearby villages to supply milk here,'' says Hasmukh Shah, managing director of Hotel Surya.

Hasmukh, who at that time was studying engineering, doubled up as one of the caretakers of the milk shop. ``Competition was cut-throat with the newly set up Baroda Dairy. I remember giving colour boxes, pencils and erasers to children of Padra as incentive to encourage their parents to give maximum milk to our outlet,'' he reminisces.

While Hasmukh worked while studying, his nephew Piyush and Daudayal Shah's son worked as a waiter at Tex Plaza in Surat. By then, the Shahs had already opened a shop selling Bengali sweets in Sayajigunj in the 1950s. ``We were the first to introduce Bengali sweets and the concept of packing sweets in cardboard,'' Piyush Shah claims.

Kalyan Sweets and Kalyan Hotel in Sayajigunj were one of the firsts of their kind in Vadodara then. ``In 1960s, it was the only hotel to have attached bath,'' he says. Then came Hotel Gaurav near the Vadodara Railway Station started by Daudayal and his brother.

On his job as a waiter, Piyush Shah says,``Nobody in our family had firsthand experience of the problems faced by waiters and cooks. The job enabled me understand the problems of both the guests and the staff.'' After serving as a waiter and storekeeper in Mumbai-based hotels, he went abroad.

His stay abroad inspired him to set up a fast food joint in India and he set up Kalyan in Fatehgunj. It became an instant hit. When Hotel Surya was set up in 1976, it became the first hotel to serve buffet on a regular basis. Then came Hotel Surya Palace in 1987. Unfortunately, the hotel was declared a sick unit and to overcome the loss the Shahs went public. Hard work and the move paid off, says Piyush Shah.

``I am a happy man today, but still have a long way to go,'' Hasmukh Shah says. He plans to set up a power plant in Bajwa to utilise the unutilised gas pool there.

Piyush Shah, too, is content. ``We have more than what we can use. However, if I feel, I can built 100 hotels like Hotel Surya Palace. The atom has been broken, the chain reaction is not difficult.'' He also plans to set up a Nautropathic Clinic near Mahisagar.