For years we never heard Nita Ambani and on the seldom occasions we saw her it was as part of the large clan. ``When I got married at 21 my first priority was Mukesh and adjusting in the family. Then, the childen came.'' But now that the twins Akash, Isha and the youngest, Hari Anant, are a little older, Nita Ambani, the individual, is asserting her identity.

Flush with the success of her work at Jamnagar, the largest petro-chemical complex in India, she has now decided to convert the Hurkisondas Hospital into a modern, ultra-specialty health care centre which will have the latest state of the art medical facilities and will also offer the same at subsidised cost to the poor. Typically,there are no half-measures with her. In a few months she will appear for the entrance examination for a hospital management course at Harvard. ``I am busy swotting these days,'' she laughs.

Growing up in a joint family in Santacruz (her father worked for the Birlas) Nita's only ambition was to become a dancer. ``Whenever I found time from climbing chikoo trees in our backyard, I would devote it to dance,'' she says. It was at one such performance at the Birla Matushree that she was spotted by Kokilaben, the Ambani matriarch, who decided that Nita would wed Mukesh.

After that it was a whirligig. ``But even in those days I studied interior designing, continued my dance training and took up a job at Sunflower school teaching little children. So in that sense, I have always been a working woman,'' she says. But it has only been in the last two years, encouraged by her husband, that she is playing a vital role in the businss. ``In 1994, I had helped set up a school and a clinic at Patalganga. So when thefamily decided to start the project at Jamnagar, Mukesh suggested that I should pitch in.'' Her first trip was a trifle daunting. ``From the helicopter all I could see was a barren patch of brown,'' she says. But it also hooked her. Clad in yellow industrial hat, salwar kameez and keds, she became a familiar figure at the site. Together with her core team Nita has wrought a near miracle on the 900 acres. They have built a medical centre, a market, a school, formed the Reliance Employees Wives' Association and planted enough trees to convert the `dry patch' into a green haven.

``We have 65,000 people working for us. Some of the best talent from the world has been drawn in to work there. We had to provide an environment where they and their families could work and live in comfort,'' she says. But even before the hossanas for her work at Jamnagar could subside, she was onto the Hurkisondas project. ``While working on the Jamnagar project I use to fly there thrice a week, work 14 to 15 hours a day. I think thatbecame addictive,'' she smiles.

Her vision for the hospital is part of her larger plan to work for ``better education and health care opportunities in India.'' At Hurkisondas, she has about two lakh square feet to implement her new ideas. ``The existing hospital will be used for the poor patients and we will construct two additional wings which will house the superspecialities. But for the moment, she is delighted with the revamped paediatrics wing which will be inaugurated on Dussehra. The time she spends with the children there on her weekly Wednesday visits is ``treasured.''

But when she is not working, Nita is happiest spending time with her three children and husband Mukesh. ``It gives me great joy to see my daughter take up dance.'' Sometimes she misses those young, carefree days of her dance classes when Mukesh would impatiently pace outside waiting for her to finish. Never the social butterfly, her idea of an evening out now is to once in a while go chill at the Fashion Bistro, with Mukesh, ofcourse.