Interviewtimes 
Surya Kanta Behera, Mega Builders & DevelopersFrom pharmacy to realty: An inspirational transition”
Here is an inspirational story of an ordinary pharmacy store owner from a small town in Bhadrak district shaping an extraordinary empire of an emerging brand in the real estate sector in Odisha- Mega Builders and Developers, an ISO: 9001 certified company. Over the years, it has developed more than 200 acres of land into premium properties in the heart of Bhubaneswar. Most astonishingly, the ongoing project Signature Arcade sprawling around seven acres of land and comprising more than 200 flats in five blocks along with 40 duplexes invited frenzied booking response. The man behind this rare feat hails from a pharmaceutical fraternity. Is this not a story worth telling?
After completing his Post Graduation in Pharmacy, he went back to his home town Bhadrak for opening a medicine store to utilize his theoretical knowledge. He had to be self-reliant as well. Taking a few lakh of loan from his father for chasing his dreams of his future as a successful medicine store, he kicked off his entrepreneurial journey. But all went in vain when the tragic flood ravaged the state in 1999. His dream of running a thriving medicine store went abegging. Having no job left, he had to come back to Bhubaneswar to fend for himself. As the situation demanded, he joined a real estate company to sustain his professional momentum. But little he could realize then that he would catapult to be one of the most sought after real estate developers in the state.
In doing his job meticulously, he has earned his stripes as a trusted guy by the clients as well as the promoters. That’s because trust is one thing which matters the most in this real estate sector. In a few years of his executive job, he won the faith of the land owners which was perhaps the turning point of his tough life then.
But the infamous chit fund that surfaced later eroded the trust of almost all realty developers in Odisha. Money earned by hard toil went into the hands of scheming manipulators and fly-by-night players, dashing hopes of the common man. The bleak scenario in the aftermath of the chit fund scandal erected a huge wall of mistrust between the real estate companies and their potential customers. It was during this hour of crisis that a clutch of land owners reposed faith in Mr S K Behera, offering their patch of lands to be developed as real estate properties. Back then, it wasn’t easy to buy lands directly from the landowners due to exorbitant costs. But Behera treaded on this risk laden journey and inched ahead. Since then, he never trailed and went on to monetize the lands, developing one premium project after the other. And, selling them with elan!
Behera floated his own property firm- Mega Builder and Developers complying with the norms of Real Estate Regulatory Authority (RERA) in 2008.
“This tough stand of RERA enabled developers like us to win the hearts of our clients because of our sincere Construction works and responsible paper works under guidance of RERA itself. It has truly helped us to build a bridge between developers and buyers. Henceforth, from the maiden project THE VILLAGE to SIGNATURE ARCADE to ADYA PALACE, there has been timeless contributions from the home owners in large”, he says.
Behera strongly believes that the two things in life or business that pay the most are an honest approach to your customers or people and the incessant hard work.
He invokes being a successful developer as the magic wand but retaining your customers in a long term association, the alternative of being a successful developer. “I don’t need any advertising to sell any properties. It’s your existing customers who bring you on your behalf. And what gives me more satisfaction is of course my customers thanking me for getting genuine properties at reasonable prices without compromising the quality of work”.
