How Sudha and Narayana Murthy were brought together by books, music, and dosa

From left: Akshata Murthy, Sudha Murthy, NR Narayana Murthy, and Rohan Murthy

When a young man opened his doors one afternoon to find a lady who wanted to borrow a novel from his collection, little did he know that they would be narrating their story to the world after nearly 50 years as NR Narayana Murthy and Sudha Murthy, the Infosys power-couple.

Infosys Co-Founder NR Narayana Murthy and his philanthropist wife and former Chairperson of Infosys Foundation, Sudha Murthy, were speaking at the launch of Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's book, "An Uncommon Love: The Early Life of Sudha and Narayana Murthy."

The Murthy family was in full attendance on February 10, with son Rohan Murthy and daughter (and UK's first lady) Akshata Murthy accompanying their parents, along with their granddaughters Anoushka and Krishna.

The crowd gathered in Bengaluru's St Joseph's College of Commerce to hear Narayana and Sudha Murthy was charmed by the story of how the couple met for the first time.

The book

In the early 1970s, one of her friends told Mrs Murthy, an avid reader, that  his roommate owned an extensive collection of books. Intrigued, she decided to head towards their residence in Pune.

“When I knocked on the door, a college student opened it: petite, bespectacled, very serious, and very young. I wondered who he was?” Sudha told the audience. In reality, Narayana Murthy is four years elder to Sudha. “I thought he’s so small in structure and reading so much,” she said as the audience burst into laughter.

That day, Narayana Murthy asked Sudha Kulkarni out for dinner at a nearby restaurant, and the rest, as they say, is history.

A stealthy affair

While Narayana Murthy was working at Tata Administrative Services (TAS), the couple would go on movie dates and risk breaking the night curfew in place at the women’s hostel in Pune, where she resided.

At the time, Sudha Murthy was employed at Tata Engineering and Locomotive Company, and had the distinction of being the first and only woman on the shop floor.

Narayana Murthy said he found out a unique way to sneak Sudha Murthy back into the hostel. He would  throw pebbles at a room to distract the guard. As soon as the guard left to check, Sudha would slip into the hostel unnoticed.

Song and dosa

The couple frequented the restaurant Dakshin in Pune, which served south Indian dishes. Narayana Murthy said the waiters would often ask him to leave after they had been occupying the table for three long hours, and singing the Hindi song Abhi na jaao chhor kar, ke ki dil abhi bhara nahi.

The couple would simply move to a different restaurant and continue singing. And romancing.