Jeewanlal Motichand Shah had moved in early 1900 to Calcutta where, in Howrah area, he set up a facility for manufacture of aluminum utensils.

He quit this business later and in 1939, took over Mukand Iron & Steel Works Ltd. with its factory in Lahore and at Reay Road, Bombay (now Mumbai) jointly with Jamnalal Bajaj at the instance of Mahatma Gandhi.

This company, set up by Lala Mukandlal of Lahore, a follower of Mahatma Gandhi, was then on the verge of liquidation and Gandhiji persuaded Jeewanlal and Jamnalal to take over and run it in order to protect the livelihood of its employees.

[citation needed] He actively campaigned for remedial action against Ingress of salinity in the South West Coast of Saurashtra in the State of Gujarat.

[citation needed] The economic reforms that commenced in India in the 1990s were substantially those that Viren Shah and his colleagues in politics canvassed assiduously since the 1960s.

The breadth of his outlook, marked by rare expansiveness of temperament, was such that he made friends easily all across the political spectrum: Communists, Socialists, Congressmen, Jan Sanghis et al.

Advani recounts an anecdote involving Jyoti Basu, the Communist Party (Marxist) Chief Minister of West Bengal.

'[citation needed] "The message had come from Viren Shah, a well-known Mumbai-based industrialist who, though an office-bearer of the BJP for some time, was also a good acquaintance of Basu.

The NDA government later appointed him Governor of West Bengal, after, of course, consulting with and getting enthusiastic concurrence from Chief Minister Jyoti Basu.

His monograph on 'Technology Transfers', first published as 'Chairman's Statement' to the shareholders of Mukand Ltd. before the economic reforms in the early 1990s in India anticipated, again, the needs of the 'globalized' world.

Once an admirer of the Presidential system of government, a cause that he championed with great enthusiasm, he changed his opinion during his second term as a Member of Parliament and set out in detail his reasons, characterizing the presidential system as prone to be turned into dictatorship as in several third world countries or as designed to deadlock as in the United States of America.

[citation needed] In the second half of 1970s, Viren Shah played a role in public affairs that was without parallel for an industrialist or businessman in India or anywhere.

In the midst of the resulting turmoil, Allahabad High Court declared her election invalid on grounds of corrupt electoral practice.

She added in her letter addressed to the president on 25 June 1975 that the matter was extremely urgent, that she would have liked to have taken this to the Cabinet but that unfortunately this was not possible that night and recommended that such a proclamation be issued.

There was no report from the Intelligence Bureau, State Governments or from the Union Ministry of Home Affairs to corroborate the facts alleged by her.

The Commission of Enquiry led by Justice J C Shah later documented how the 'diamond-bright, diamond-hard hope' was belied by setting out a plethora of facts on the arbitrary killings, atrocities and other executive excesses committed under the cover of emergency.

Judicial proceedings could not be reported; public meetings could not be held without the permission of the police which was given to "the cringing and the craven" and refused to sober and responsible men; a servile radio and television worked under government orders.

It is in this backdrop that a group of intrepid individuals including Viren J Shah came together in an underground movement spearheaded by George Fernandes to oppose the emergency.

New Delhi set out the "names of offence and circumstances connected…" in respect of 25 accused persons including George Fernandes and Viren J Shah says: "Investigation showed that on the declaration of Emergency in the Country on 25.6.75, George Fernandes A-1 went underground and decided to arouse resistance against the imposition of the same and to overawe the Government by use and show of criminal force."

The article on George Fernandes in Wikipedia says: "an industrialist friend, Viren J Shah, Managing Director of Mukand Ltd., helped them find contacts for procuring dynamites, used extensively in quarries around Halol (near Baroda).

Intelligence reports led her to believe that the time chosen by her for the elections was the most appropriate, for at a later date economic difficulties would come to the surface, and the underground movement would grow stronger."

Parikh, Accused No.5 in the Baroda Dynamite case, many persons opposed to Mrs. Indira Gandhi were aggrieved later that those who led the movement did not enlist them and said that they would have joined it if they had known about it.