The torches came again for his job, as they always seemed to do, but he didn't flinch.

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He didn't flinch when prosecutors played five audiotapes, recorded while he was in jail awaiting his day in court.

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"It was a bold bet, but Kumar didn't flinch from making it, " says Sumant Sinha, Birla's former finance head, who now chairs Savant Advisors, a Mumbai corporate finance consultancy.

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