Khadim Batti: A relentless builder, generous mentor and lifelong learner 🙏🏽
My colleague @BhavyaDKumar , who tracks the Indian SaaS ecosystem closely has written this beautiful tribute based on her conversations with Khadim over the years.
"Almost every young founder I met seemed to have a meeting scheduled with Khadim either in Bengaluru or in the US. At some point, my curiosity got the better of me. I asked him if he was mentoring so many startup founders.
His answer surprised me.
He said he probably learnt more from the founders he met than they learnt from him
Our last conversation was in August. As usual, AI came up.
“There is so much in AI, Bhavya,” he told me. “I wish I could go back to college.”
He laughed about how, as a founder, staying updated was simultaneously “too exciting” and “a nightmare”.
He made learning feel less like something you finished and more like something you owed yourself.
And perhaps that is how many founders will remember him, not simply as the CEO of Whatfix, but as the founder they could call, the mentor who would listen, and the friend who would always argue back.
He was 51 when he died following a cardiac arrest on September 1.
For an ecosystem that talks endlessly about building companies, Khadim leaves behind a much bigger lesson: build people, too."
