Reborn In 17th century India with Black Technology

20th January 1660

Akhand Bharatiya Empire

Soon enough, the news about military privatization spread throughout the empire through the *Bharatam Daily* Newspaper, along with the announcement of the date and time for the official auction.

The people from all walks of life were extremely surprised by the decision taken by His Majesty. No one had expected that His Majesty would actually privatize military enterprises. Converting the factories into civilian enterprises and privatizing them they could understand, but privatizing the military just did not make sense to many people.

An old man who was a member of a town Panchayat expressed his doubt, "Is it really necessary? Why do the weapons used by the military have to be produced by a private company? Will it be safe?"

"That's right," his fellow colleagues nodded their heads, expressing their approval.

In fact, the majority of the people in the empire had similar doubts and concerns as they could not understand why His Majesty did such a thing. It was the same for the elites who got to know about the news beforehand. However, since the number of mistakes Vijay had made in his career could be counted on one hand, no one outright took to the streets to express their constitutional rights in disagreeing with the decision.

The matter eventually settled down, and interest in the issue slowly began to dwindle, mainly because the privatization of the military sector did not directly affect the civilian populace of the nation. However, it was a completely different matter for the ultra-rich and the elites of the empire.

"Chatterjee, how much have you planned to invest?" a businessman from Solanki Puri (Gujarat) enquired.

Chatterjee smiled as he wiped his mouth with a napkin. "About 900,000 Varaha," he said while he grabbed a handful of jeera (appetizer). "What about you, Banerjee? I heard that you have sold most of your property. Is it for this?"

Banerjee put the spoon down. "Yes, I have managed to prepare around 1.3 million Varaha."

'Gasp!'

"So much?!" Chatterjee's eyes widened. "Are you sure that investing in the military conglomerate will definitely be lucrative? From the looks of it, you're practically betting all of your assets," he enquired, surprised by the bravery. "It's a big risk."

Banerjee smiled but then he shook his head. "I have looked at the management log of the enterprises, and what I discovered is that, till now, these enterprises have only been selling arms and ordnance to a limited number of countries, while there is a huge demand for its weapons from other countries overseas. Do you know what this means?" His eyes blazed with enthusiasm.

Chatterjee shook his head and gestured for the waiter to bring him the bill. He was going to pay for the meal; Banerjee was doing him a huge favour this time.

"It means that the current military-industrial enterprises of the Bharatiya Empire have actually not realized their full potential. Once we begin to sell arms and ordnance to other European countries, the profit is bound to explode, especially since we can charge a premium to the countries we do not have strategic alliances with. What's more, selling arms to merchants is the biggest blue ocean yet to be explored by the military enterprises."

"I dare say that now is the best chance and the opportunity that comes once in a lifetime to invest in military enterprises."

"At least there are five tier-one shipyards and three tier-two shipyards for the Navy, but there are only three military conglomerates in the Bharatiya Empire for the massive army. If this is not a golden opportunity, then what is?"

Listening to the passionate explanation of Banerjee, Chatterjee was shaken. 'Should I liquidate some of my assets?' He began to hesitate—the vision shown by Banerjee was just too enticing for him.

Such conversations were happening all over the empire, with people frantically mobilizing all their financial resources. Interestingly enough, this led to land prices falling across the empire to the lowest point in the last 10 years.

However, no one was actually losing. The people who sold the land hastily made up for their losses by holding a stake in one of the two military conglomerates, while the people who bought the land for cheap profited later on when the land prices normalized, and their value further exceeded.

Rajas, Mahamantris, Mantris, top business owners, industrialists, and elites of the empire all gathered together for this capital feast.

---

22nd January 1660

In a blink of an eye, the date of the auction had arrived. The place where the auction would be held was none other than the Parliament building.

Joseph Oppenheimer, Dharmendra, Jagannath Mohan, and Rajesh all arrived at the Parliament early in the morning to verify and review the details and procedures of the auction one last time.

Soon, the red carpet was draped on the floor as luxurious carriages started to arrive one after another. If someone from the future were to see the scene, they could almost immediately mistake it for an Oscar event, just Indian.

By 10:00 o'clock in the morning, a total of 1,256 people had gathered in the Parliament room—nobles, business elites, and dignitaries of the empire.

In fact, the people who were investing in the conglomerates were more than 2,000, but since the majority of them could not make it to the Imperial Capital, they employed agents on their behalf to buy the stake for them. In this case, since high-level agents were rare, a single agent who had attended the auction had multiple clients.

"Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the grandest auction of the year, where we will be auctioning off around 80% equity in two of the three military-industrial conglomerates of the empire."

"Before we get started, let me give a brief introduction."

"All three conglomerates have almost equal numbers of industrial manufacturing plants, along with their own sales channels, manufacturing patents, and manufacturing rights for all the military issue weaponry of the Bharatiya Empire."

"Out of the three conglomerates, the Southern and the Northern are being put up for auction, while the Central is the private property of the royal family, now named Dynasty Corporation."

"The Southern conglomerate consists of 275 factories built in the Kaveri Riverbank industrial zone and its southern tributaries."

"The Northern conglomerate consists of 282 factories culminating from various northern tributaries and industrial zones of Mahanati and Narmada."

"With that being said, without further ado, let's get straight to the auction."

*Clap* *Clap* *Clap* *Clap* *Clap*

Applause immediately erupted from the excited crowd.

Vijay, who was seated on the top floor of the parliament overlooking the auction, had a thoughtful expression on his face.

"Who are the top contenders?" he enquired.

Ganesh, who was right next to Vijay, immediately answered.

"There are mainly three, Your Majesty."

" All three led by influential figures in the military and Kings"

"Raja Jayadwaj Singha, Raja Kiran Poojari, Raja Yogendra Singh, and Raja Sarvesh Ranavikrama have joined together with some of the most affluent merchants from the northern part of the empire, like the Chauhan family, the Parmar family, the Bundela family, the Tomar family, the Deshmukh family, among others, to form a group."

"Raja Adithya Bhonsle, Raja Ramayya Senapati, along with some of the most affluent noble and merchant families, like the Shetty family, the Kalyan family, and the Berunda family, have come together to form the second group."

"Raja Gangadhar and Raja Narasimha Nayak have joined their hands with Indrasena Reddy, Bajrang Dharani, Naveen Ambani, Arjan Bakshi, Bhupathi, Rohan Takral, Indra Naidu, Akash, the Kombu family, and the Joshi family to form a group."

"Overall, out of the nine kings of the Bharatiya Empire, all eight have participated in the auction, while His Excellency Logananda Senapati is in bad health and cannot travel anywhere."

Vijay was surprised that the elites of the southern part of the empire did not take on a united front this time, while the group from the north was extremely united, with all the resources used on the tip of the knife.

'I guess this is what happens when one part of the empire becomes disproportionately rich, I guess... They start to have divisions among themselves,' Vijay thought.

"Who do you think has the biggest chance to win the auction?"

Ganesh thought for a while and shook his head. "I can't be too sure, Your Majesty." Stay tuned with empire

"I feel like the group gathered by Raja Jayadwaj Singha is bound to win a conglomerate, just by looking at the number of kings present in the group." The yearly salary of a king, adjusted for inflation, is currently 450,000 Varaha per year, and this is salary alone, given that kings do not have to pay personal income tax. Most of the kings, no matter how financially illiterate they are, are at least millionaires, while those savvy with their funds are multimillionaires.

"As for who would win in the competition between the two southern groups, it's hard to tell."

"While one has established families like the Shetty family and the Kalyan family, the other has a large number of new-generation business leaders and industrialists."

"But if I have to make a choice, I would choose the group led by Ramayya Senapati and Aditya Bhonsle simply because the Shetty family controls the Shetty and Cooperative Industrial Bank, and the Kalyan family controls the Bharatiya Southern United Bank, while their opponent only controls a few insurance firms and investment banks. Maybe in a year or two they could probably match the wealth of legacy families, but right now, I'm not too optimistic unless they have a trump card up their sleevs."

Vijay nodded; he thought so too.

---

The auction for the Northern Conglomerate, located along the Mahanati and Narmada Rivers, was about to begin.

"Starting bid, 400 million Varaha. Is there a higher bid?"

"410 million Varaha," someone called out.

"410 from Raja Jayadwaj Singha. Is there a higher bid?"

"430 million Varaha," came the next offer.

"430 from Raja Senapati. Is there a higher bid?"

"460 million Varaha."

"...."

"...."

"...."

"512 million Varaha,"

"512 million Varaha from Raja Gangadhar. Is there a higher bid?" the auctioneer announced.

The auctioneer looked at the three kings, waiting for a response. But seeing that no one responded, he proceeded to close the deal.

"512 million Varaha. Going to Raja Gangadhar and his group. Going once, going twice—" Just before the gavel came down, a voice shouted.

"520 million Varaha!" Raja Jayadwaj Singha yelled, clenching his fists tightly.

Gangadhar hesitated. He thought for a moment, and after a short discussion with his group, he decided not to raise the bid.

"520 million Varaha. Northern Military Conglomerate, going to Raja Jayadwaj Singha and his group. Going once, going twice. Final chance—no one else? Thud! SOLD!"

"Yes!"

"Clap!" "Clap!" "Clap!" "Clap!"

Cheers and applause immediately broke out from the group led by Jaya Dwaj Singha, who were mostly northerners.

The auction for the Southern Conglomerate immediately started. Unsurprisingly, the first bid was massive:

"450,000,000 Varaha."

It only went up from there:

"465,000,000 Varaha."

"500 million Varaha."

"516,000,000 Varaha."

"525,000,000 Varaha."

"529,000,000 Varaha."

"...."

Gangadhar was regretting it now. He should have gone all out for the Northern Conglomerate and not waited for the Southern one.

"Sold! Southern Military Conglomerate sold to Ramayya Senapati and his group, at 531,000,000 Varaha."

Ravi Shetty and Pawan Kalyan smiled softly, gave a round of applause, and congratulated each other.