THE COMPANY OF CROREPATIS
POOR LITTLE
RICH BOYS
The meltdown has wiped away 61 per cent of the wealth of the country’s
top billionaires. B G SHIRSAT & RANJU SARKAR report
BIG, BIGGER, BIGGEST
D
ILLUSTRATION BY BINAY SINHA
TOP 100 BILLIONAIRES: HOW THEY STACK UP
Rank
Wealth (Rs crore)
‘08 ‘09
Promoters
Flagship company
Industry
1
2
4
3
7
5
8
16
10
57
50
9
12
18
27
14
15
44
38
11
21
66
13
34
54
6
22
20
49
94
58
—
35
30
—
45
25
90
105
63
28
72
75
81
47
52
32
101
39
40
MUKESH AMBANI
ANIL AMBANI
SUNIL MITTAL
K P SINGH & FAMILY
AZIM PREMJI
ANIL AGARWAL
GAUTAM S ADANI
DILIP S SHANGHVI
KUMAR MANGALAM BIRLA
MALVINDER & SHIVINDER SINGH
SAURAV TAYAL FAMILY
PRITHVIRAJ, SAJJAN & NAVEEN JINDAL
G M RAO
SHIV NADAR
RAHUL BAJAJ
VIJAY MALLYA
UDAY KOTAK
Y K HAMIED
V C BURMAN FAMILY
TULSI R TANTI
KALANITHI MARAN
BRIJMOHAN LALL MUNJAL
JAIPRAKASH GAUR
VYOMESH M SHAH & MAHIPATRAY V SHAH
ASHWIN CHOKSI, ASHWIN DANI, ABHAY VAKIL
RAMESH CHANDRA
ADI GODREJ
SUBHASH CHANDRA
MURALI KRISHNA PRASAD DIVI
NITIN SANDESARA
N R NARAYANA MURTHY
S KISHORE & K A SASTRY
GLENN SALDHANHA
KESHUB MAHINDRA
VIRENDRA D MHAISKAR
SUDHIR MEHTA
SHASHI & RAVI RUIA
PANKAJ R PATEL
D B GUPTA
SRIRAM THYGARAJ
B N KALYANI
AJAY PIRAMAL
NANDAN M NILEKANI
S GOPALAKRISHNAN
GAUTAM THAPAR
KISHORE BIYANI
B K GOENKA
HARSH C MARIWALA
R P GOENKA
RAJAN RAHEJA
Reliance Ind
Reliance Communications
Bharti Airtel
DLF
Wipro
Sterlite Ind
Adani Enterprises
Sun Pharma
Grasim Industries
Religare Enterprises
Jaybharat Textiles
Jindal Steel
GMR Infrastructure
HCL Technologies
Bajaj Auto
United Breweries
Kotak Mahindra Bank
Cipla
Dabur
Suzlon Energy
Sun TV Network
Hero Honda
Jaiprakash Associates
Akruti City
Asian Paints
Unitech
Godrej Industries
Zee Entertainment
Divi's Lab
Sterling Biotech
Infosys Technologies
KSK Energy
Glenmark Pharma
Mahindra & Mahindra
IRB Infrastructure Developers
Torrent Pharma
Essar Oil
Cadila Healthcare
Lupin
Shriram Transport Finance
Bharat Forge
Piramal Healthcare
Infosys Technologies
Infosys Technologies
Crompton Greaves
Pantaloon Retail
Welspun India
Marico
CESC
Exide Ind
Refineries
Telecommunication
Telecommunication
Realty
IT
Metals
Trading
Pharmaceutical
Diversified
Diversified
Textiles
Metals
Infrastructure
IT
Automobiles
Breweries
Bank
Pharmaceutical
FMCG
Capital goods
Media-entertainment
Automobiles
Cement
Realty
FMCG
Realty
FMCG
Media-entertainment
Pharmaceutical
Pharmaceutical
IT
Power
Pharmaceutical
Automobiles
Realty
Pharmaceutical
Refineries
Pharmaceutical
Pharmaceutical
Financial services
Auto ancillaries
Pharmaceutical
IT
IT
Capital goods
Retail
Textiles
FMCG
Diversified
Diversified
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
infrastructure space lost 80-89 per cent
of their wealth this year. This included
JK Jain of Jai Corp (his son Anand Jain,
is a close associate of RIL CMD Mukesh
Ambani), which is setting up two SEZs
near Mumbai; PNC Menon and family
of Shobha Developers; Ravi Purvankara
of Purvankara Projects; Rakeshkumar
Wadhawan of HDIL. Perhaps the only
exceptions were Vyomesh M Shah and
Mahipatray V Shah of Akruti City, who
lost only 41 per cent of their wealth.
Among the biggest losers was Tulsi
LF’s K P Singh — KP to his Tanti of Suzlon Energy, who fell eight
friends — an army officer places in the billionaire rankings to setwho quit the service to join tle at 20th place. Tanti lost 86 per cent
his father-in-law’s Delhi Land in the 12 months trailing January 2009
& Finance in 1961, became, in as the wind turbine maker’s stock came
2007, after he listed the firm, the under fire after Edison International,
world’s richest real estate baron. The one of its biggest customers in the US,
offering helped him boost his fortune cancelled an order for 150 turbines afto Rs 85,666 crore on his company's ter cracks appeared in the rotor blades.
listing day in 2007. In January 2009, a Customers were reassured only when
50 per cent drop in demand and a 20 Suzlon shipped out new turbines made
per cent drop in real estate prices, and of reinforced plastic. Its biggest acquicorrection in real estate stocks, saw sition, Repower (which makes large
him lose Rs 31,657 crore or 63 per cent turbines), has been a roller-coaster
of his wealth. The meltride. Its initial financdown has forced one of
ing plans fell through
India’s biggest real eswhen markets crumTHE LAW OF
tate developers to defer
bled. In late December,
NATURE HAS BEEN it announced it would
plans to raise another
$1.5 billion by listing
BRUTAL WITH OUR pay ¤270m to increase
an arm in Singapore.
its stake to 91 per cent,
BILLIONAIRES —
Fellow developer
as required under GerTHE BIGGER THEY man law to control the
Unitech’s
Ramesh
Chandra was worse off.
WERE, THE LARGER company. In early JanuThe sixth richest man
ary, Suzlon sold a 10
HAS BEEN THEIR
in India in 2008
per cent stake in its BelLOSS OF WEALTH. gium arm, Hansen, to a
dropped 20 places to
26th rank in 2009 as
London-based investMUKESH AMBANI
the correction in realty
ment firm for an undisLOST 58 PER CENT closed amount. This
stocks saw his wealth
shrink by Rs 52,788
could help Tanti bridge
OF HIS WEALTH
crore or 93 per cent. A
the gap and gain control
structural engineer,
of Repower.
Chandra moved into real estate in 1985
Another big loser was metals maven
to build middle-class homes. The cred- Anil Agarwal, with interests in aluit crunch and fall in stock prices has re- minium, copper and iron ore, who saw
strained the developer’s ability to raise his wealth shrink by Rs 43,176 crore or
money to fund Unitech’s homes, of- 63 per cent. While much of this was
fices and shopping malls in Delhi’s due to the fall in commodity prices,
suburbs, and across other cities in the Agarwal also paid the price for an illcountry.
advised restructuring plan, aborted imIn many ways, the change in for- mediately after a few institutional intunes of these two developers sum- vestors opposed it for favouring promarises the story of the country’s bil- moters.
lionaires this year. The law of nature
Of the 44 top losers whose net
has been brutal on them — the bigger worth is down over 80 per cent, 25 are
they were, the larger has been their loss from realty related sectors. Billionaires
of wealth. Mukesh Ambani, the coun- in commodities, oil, agriculture and
try’s wealthiest Indian, lost Rs 1,39,925 metals lost over 70 per cent each. The
crore, or 58 per cent of his wealth, as cement and steel billionaires lost heavhis flagship Reliance Industries fell on ily on government efforts to control risconcerns of flagging demand for petro- ing inflation.
leum and petrochemicals in its key export markets in the West, and the delay Defying the trend
in kicking off gas supplies from the A few billionaires added to their
wealth in an otherwise gloomy year for
Krishna-Godavari basin.
Brother Anil Ambani, the second wealth-makers. Nitin Sandesara, the
wealthiest Indian, lost Rs 1,10,082 CMD of Sterling Biotech, increased his
crore, or 66 per cent of his wealth, as wealth by Rs 806 crore, or 28.54 per
his flagship Reliance Communications cent, by creating a globally-competitive
fell in line with the broader market gelatine business. In the mid-1990s,
even as buyout talks with South the Sandesaras exited the traditional
African telco MTN failed. Mega power tea-trading business to set up a plant to
projects under Reliance Power will test manufacture gelatine at Karakhadi near
Vadodara. They were looking to enter a
his execution skills.
While the brothers retained the top business that would be globally comtwo slots, telecom czar Sunil Mittal petitive, high-tech and high-growth
swapped places with DLF promoter K P with strong entry barriers. In less than
Singh to move up a rank to No 3, while a decade, Sterling has emerged as the
Singh settled for No 4 despite eroding largest gelatin manufacturer in Asia,
with key customers in the US.
his wealth 80 per cent.
Several billionaires in the realty and Sterling’s advantage is access to cheap-
Jan '08
Jan '09
2,42,902.02 1,02,976.76
1,66,308.96 56,226.71
77,776.69 55,027.08
1,56,400.46 31,657.29
53,470.03 27,246.74
68,727.81 25,551.66
53,332.89 17,661.54
15,949.03 15,047.99
38,462.81 13,256.32
10,611.88 12,184.30
5,643.57 11,085.81
40,784.05 11,010.94
28,588.16 10,180.67
14,686.51
5,953.34
10,323.17
5,890.29
22,345.63
5,825.03
21,857.51
5,811.47
6,109.73
5,712.24
6,734.65
5,389.03
38,300.17
5,215.78
11,605.47
5,070.51
4,041.05
4,596.39
23,975.03
4,411.82
7,171.00
4,227.86
5,279.77
4,203.21
56,965.44
4,177.05
11,598.21
4,034.66
12,131.50
4,005.43
5,836.05
3,819.60
2,825.06
3,631.20
4,821.72
3,468.29
NR
3,157.43
7,056.91
3,081.56
8,338.01
2,951.48
NR
2,858.72
6,046.24
2,725.48
10,551.11
2,535.29
2,853.93
2,517.43
2,422.92
2,481.01
4,212.00
2,463.21
10,095.33
2,457.96
3,441.40
2,430.34
3,326.99
2,393.12
3,230.56
2,323.76
5,992.60
2,323.09
5,536.72
2,321.81
7,647.96
2,223.37
2,611.69
2,207.99
6,731.49
2,199.08
4,319.60
2,107.03
India’s top five: While Mukesh and
Anil Ambani retained the top two
slots, telecom czar Sunil Mittal
traded places with DLF’s K P Singh
to emerge third richest, and Azim
Premji moved up two notches
er raw material (bovine bones, which it
sources 30-60 per cent cheaper than
plants in the West) and labour, helping
it emerge among the lowest cost producers.
Continued on page 3
POOR LITTLE
RICH BOYS
among the top five companies in the
mid-cap space (Rs 100-500 crore) in
a study last year. Tayal’s growth was
fuelled by acquisitions as KSL
bought ailing textile rivals including
Surat Co-operative Mills, Kamleshwar Textile Mills, Empress Textile
Mills and Deccan Co-operative
Mills. These gave KSL the opportucontinued from page 1
nity to develop land banks, and the
group is developing 15 realty projThe other big surprise was ects: townships, hotels, commercial
Saurabh Tayal, chairman of KSL and complexes, malls, multiplexes, and
Industries, who gained Rs 5,442 warehouses across Maharashtra,
crore, or 96 per cent in wealth. A Punjab and Dadra and Nagar Haveli.
third-generation scion of an old texAmong other billionaires who detile family, Tayal has
fied a falling market
transformed the
and increased their
50-year-old textile
wealth are Lupin
OF INDIA’S 367
business and forayed
Laboratories’ D B
BILLIONAIRES,
into real estate — the
Gupta, who added
ONLY 17 ARE NEW Rs 58 crore, or 2 per
group is developing
properties in several
cent, to his wealth in
ENTRANTS,
locations. While
the 12 months trailINCLUDING 14
many textile exing January 2009;
porters are grappling
pharma billionaires
WHO TOOK THEIR
with the US scrapDilip Shanghvi of
COMPANIES
ping of the textile
Sun Pharma and Y K
PUBLIC
quota regime, KSL’s
Hamied of Cipla
revenue and net
managed to retain
profits have grown
their wealth. The
36 per cent and 116 per cent respec- biggest gainers were brothers
tively year-on-year over three years Malvinder and Shivinder Singh,
till March 2007, helping it emerge who sold their 34.86 per cent stake
Rank
Wealth (Rs crore)
‘08 ‘09
Promoters
Flagship company
Industry
17
62
64
70
24
74
61
33
96
79
59
106
80
29
41
36
48
102
108
26
82
85
69
51
128
97
43
77
129
144
46
42
83
180
92
56
121
53
–
116
134
73
84
19
60
55
115
198
37
127
RAKESHKUMAR WADHAWAN
NUSLI WADIA
MANOJ G TIRODKAR
PRS OBEROI
LAGADAPATI MADHUSUDAN RAO
MURUGAPPAN FAMILY
SHANTANU PRAKASH
G V KRISHNA REDDY
K ANJI REDDY
B K PARKEH & FAMILY
SAMIR JAIN & FAMILY
K DINESH
RAJJU D SHROFF
V N DHOOT & FAMILY
RAGHAV BAHL
SATYA NARIAN PRAKASH PUNJ
HINDUJA BROTHERS
VIVEK CHAAND SEHGAL
S D SHIBULAL
REJI ABRAHAM
KIRAN MAZUMDAR SHAW
RAKESH & REKHA JHUNJHUNWALA
VENU SRINIVASAN & SURESH KRISHNA
ANU AGA
R S AGARWAL
KARSANBHAI KHODIDAS PATEL
ASHOK SARIN & ANIL SARIN
B G BANGUR
SANDIP & SANJAY JHUNJHUNWALA
SHASHI KIRAN SHETTY
NARESH GOYAL
NIMESH NAGINDAS KAMPANI
SHYAM SUNDER BHARTIA
MAM RAMASWAMY & GEETHA MUTHIAH
K M SHETH & FAMILY
JIGNESH P SHAH
BS & GS SAWHNEY, DPS KOHILI
S N KIRLOSKAR
ISMAIL G MEMON & FAMILY
P K KHURANA
ABHIJIT RAJAN
H F KHORAKIWALA
D P JINDAL
J K JAIN
B G RAGHUPATHY
B K BIRLA
H S BEDI
ARVIND T SHAH
ROHTAS GOEL & FAMILY
ANALJIT SINGH
HDIL
Bombay Dyeing
GTL
EIH
Lanco Infratech
EID Parry
Educomp Solutions
GVK Power & Infra
Dr Reddy's Labs
Pidilite Ind
Entertainment Network
Infosys Technologies
United Phosphorus
Videocon Ind
TV18
Punj Lloyd
Hinduja TMT
Motherson Sumi
Infosys Technologies
Aban Offshore
Biocon
Investor
TVS Motors
Thermax
Emami
Nirma
Anant Raj Ind
Shree Cement
Rei Agro
Allcargo Global
Jet Airways
JM Financial
Jubilant Organosys
Chettinad Cement
G E Shipping
Financial Technology
Koutons Retail
Kirloskar Brothers
KGN Industries
Everest Kanto Cylinder
Gammon India
Wockhardt
Maharashtra Seamless
Jai Corp
BGR Energy Sys
Century Textiles
Tulip Telecom
Asian Star
Omaxe
Max India
Realty
Diversified
IT
Services-hotels
Engineering
Diversified
IT
Infrastructure
Pharmaceutical
Chemicals
Media-entertainment
IT
Pesticides
Diversified
Media-news
Constructions
Diversified
Auto ancillaries
IT
Oil exploration
Pharmaceutical
Diversified
Automobiles
Capital goods
FMCG
FMCG
Realty
Cement
Agro products
Logistics
Aviation
Financial services
Chemicals
Cement
Shipping
IT
Retail
Engineering
Miscellaneous
Packaging
Engineering
Pharmaceutical
Metals
Infrastructure
Engineering
Diversified
Telecommunication
Gems & Jewellery
Realty
Pharmaceutical
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
Jan '08
15,812.50
4,224.87
4,185.71
3,532.71
11,114.12
3,389.69
4,226.35
7,444.48
2,772.75
3,265.69
4,616.66
2,420.50
3,232.00
9,916.80
6,482.12
6,842.70
5,917.18
2,572.62
2,121.56
10,407.97
3,131.96
3,078.69
3,743.09
5,552.91
1,817.91
2,771.65
6,349.53
3,295.66
1,817.22
1,563.59
6,004.01
6,477.58
3,123.32
1,141.96
2,834.48
4,890.04
1,962.48
5,353.15
NR
1,992.46
1,737.12
3,401.90
3,087.01
14,293.84
4,269.41
4,981.00
2,002.30
1,033.36
6,819.65
1,821.47
Jan '09
2,080.86
2,079.53
2,065.26
2,038.68
2,018.01
2,002.10
1,950.09
1,948.53
1,931.99
1,842.39
1,756.06
1,741.08
1,682.86
1,633.46
1,626.41
1,578.21
1,564.54
1,550.10
1,526.04
1,400.98
1,381.56
1,362.79
1,317.84
1,304.24
1,279.48
1,279.48
1,238.63
1,232.43
1,199.54
1,189.67
1,185.39
1,119.12
1,080.41
1,051.63
1,047.23
1,029.69
1,016.50
1,007.45
985.75
978.39
948.50
940.94
913.39
912.78
897.17
891.19
874.79
872.51
856.01
841.01
in Ranbaxy Laboratories to Japan’s
Daiichi Sankyo at a hefty premium
to its current stock price. They
added Rs 1,572 crore to their combined wealth, taking their net worth
to Rs 10,611 crore. Had they not sold
out, they would have been poorer by
Rs 4,654 crore.
Brijmohan Lall Munjal, patriarch
of the Hero Group, managed to hold
on to his wealth on the basis of a
good show by the flagship Hero Honda, which consolidated its share of
the two-wheelers market at the cost
of rivals like Bajaj and TVS Motors.
A few others who defied the odds included Chandir Gidwani and
Khushroo P Byramjee of Centrul
Capital, Sudhir Shankar Moravekar
of Panoramic Universal (hotels),
Prem Adip of MVL (constructions)
and Harish Belwal of Intra Infotech.
These billionaires had the highest
increase in wealth in percentage
terms.
Of India’s 367 billionaires, only
17 are new entrants, including 14
who took their companies public.
Sixty-eight billionaires in 2008 were
also dollar billionaires (rupee:dollar
conversion rate of Rs 39.37 for January 2008), but in 2009, only 20 figure
as dollar billionaires (rupee:dollar
exchange rate of Rs 48.88 for
January 2009).
Prominent among those who’ve
ceased to be dollar billionaires are
Kalanithi Maran of Sun TV,
Jaiprakash Gaur of Jaiprakash Associates, Glenn Saldhanha of Glenmark Pharma, Brijmohan Lall Munjal of Hero Honda, Subhash Chandra
of Zee Entertainment, and Adi Godrej of Godrej group.
Despite the sharp corrections in
their stocks, the realty, infrastructure and construction sector produced 46 billionaires, followed by
capital goods (including engineering) and pharmaceuticals (32 each),
IT (31), diversified (27), metals (25),
media and textiles (21 each). Automobiles, financial services, FMCG
and cement sectors together added
65 billionaires, while the remaining
104 billionaires were from sectors
such as services, retail, sugar,
telecom, trading, and gems and
jewellery.
STACKING UP
Falling out of favour
The fall in the Sensex saw 207 billionaires drop out of the 2009 Billionaire Club. Among the wellknown were IT entrepreneurs Atul K
Nishar (Hexaware), M V Srinivas
(Northgate Technologies) and K Padmanabhan (Teledatata Informatics),
and Hyderabad-based infrastructure
developers like Nama Nageswar Rao
and Nama Seethaiah of Madhucon
Projects, and D S Chandra Mohan
Reddy of Prajay
Realty developers like Lalit Gandhi and Naina Shah of Lok Housing,
and Deepak Kulkarni of DS Kulkarni
& Brothers, who became billionaires
on the back of their IPOs, could not
sustain their position. Big investors
like Vinod Khosla (Praj Industries),
Ranjitsinh A Parmar (Suzlon Energy), Vivek Mundra (Aban Offshore),
Bharat K Sheth (Financial Technologies — though he remains MD of
Great Eastern Shipping), GR
Gopinath (Kingfisher Airlines) and
Vineet Nayyar also went off the list
as the value of their investments fell
sharply.
The poster boys of media and entertainment who exited from the list
included Ajay Bijli of PVR, Subhash
Ghai of Mukta Arts, Nirmal N
Kotecha and P S Saminatha of Pyra-
(From top) Metal merchant Anil
Agarwal’s wealth shrank by
63 per cent; Gautam S Adani lost
too; unlike Dilip Shanghvi, Kumar
Mangalam Birla and Malvinder
Singh of Religare who got richer
mid Saimira, Anuradha Shukla of
BAG Films & Media, Rasesh B
Kanakia of Cinemax India, and Raajhendhran of Raj TV. Key pharmaceutical players excluded from The
Billionaire Club are the Sarabhai
family of Ambalal Sarabhai Enterprises, K R Ravishankar and Arun
Kumar of Strides Arcolab, and S Devendra of Sashun Chemicals.
Casualties in auto components
included Jag Mohan Kapur of Sona
Kayo Steering, Arvind Kapur of Rico
Auto, and D K Jain of Lumax. Several billionaires in the metals space,
especially of midcap companies,
also fell by the wayside after riding
the commodity cycle for two years.