“Makar Sankranti is not a festival for family businesses. It is a governance deadline.”
By CA Surekha S Ahuja
It is a moment of reckoning.
As the Sun begins its northward journey (Uttarayan), Indian tradition marks the shift from inertia to movement. In family enterprises, the same moment defines whether leadership evolves into an institution—or remains trapped in personality.
Surya to Shani: Authority Must Become Order
Makar Sankranti marks the Sun’s entry into Capricorn, governed by Shani.
In Vedic understanding:
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Surya symbolises the founder—vision, command, presence.
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Shani symbolises succession—discipline, systems, accountability.
This transition is not a reduction of power.
It is the formalisation of power.
Family businesses fracture when authority is retained emotionally instead of transferred structurally.
The Rig Veda offers no ambiguity:
“Sangachhadhwam samvadadhwam”
Progress is collective—or it is not progress.
Uttarayan in the Gita: Detachment Is Leadership
The Bhagavad Gita (8.24) describes Uttarayan as the path of transcendence. In enterprise terms, it demands detachment from ego and attachment to order.
This is why nearly 70% of Indian family businesses do not survive beyond the second generation. Governance postponed inevitably becomes conflict accelerated.
The Kite Doctrine
A kite does not rise because it is free.
It rises because it is controlled.
Vision (The Kite): One institutional direction, not competing ambitions.
Governance (The Thread): Defined ownership, succession clarity, compliance discipline, and capital logic.
Purification (The Fire): Periodic removal of inefficiencies, legacy burdens, and unresolved egos.
When the thread weakens, collapse is only a matter of time.
Conclusion
Family businesses do not break in courts.
They break in silence.
Makar Sankranti does not ask families to celebrate.
It demands that they align.
Hold the thread together—or watch the kite fall.
