India recorded its slowest economic growth in six years in the June quarter of 2019/20 but the slowdown has not affected some of India’s richest business tycoons.
Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani has emerged as India’s richest man for the 12th consecutive year, according to the 2019 Forbes India Rich List.
While more than a half of India’s 100 richest saw a decline in their net worth, Mr Ambani added $4.1 billion (USD) to bring his net worth to $51.4 billion, as Reliance’s Jio, the telecom unit became one of India’s biggest mobile carriers with 340 million subscribers.
Months after work finally started on his Australian coal mine in Northern Queensland, Indian infrastructure tycoon Gautam Adani has become the second richest Indian.
Adani Group chairman Gautam Adani meets with Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk at the Port of Townsville Source: AAP Image/ Cameron Laird
Mr Adani jumped eight spots to Number two this year with a net worth of $15.7 billion.
Adani Enterprises which is into energy, ports among other businesses also acquired rights to upgrade and operate six airports in India this year.
The Hinduja brothers ranked at No. 3 this year with a net worth of $15.6 billion, while Pallonji Mistry ranks No. 4 with $15 billion.
Banker Uday Kotak made it the top five for the first time with a net worth of $14.8 billion after Kotak Mahindra Bank stocks rose 39 per cent in the past year.
India's ten richest people in 2019
Source: Forbes India
Azim Premji dropped from Number 2 to Number 17 with his net worth plunging from $21 billion last year to $7.2 billion this year after he gave away a chunk of his fortune to charity.
Brian Carvalho, Editor of Forbes India, said: “It’s been a challenging economic year with notable changes in the list, but the good news is that we are still seeing the emergence of new billionaires with contemporary business models.”
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Meet the new billionaires
Six newcomers made it to India’s 100 Richest list this year which included the Singh family (who inherited the fortune of pharma magnate Samprada Singh, founder of Alkem Laboratories), Byju Raveendran (founder of ed-tech unicorn Byju’s), Mahendra Prasad (Aristo Pharmaceuticals, Manohar Lal and Madhusudan Agarwal (Haldiram Snacks), Rajesh Mehra (sanitary ware, Jaquar) and Sandeep Engineer (Astral Poly Tecknik).
Byju Raveendran at Number 72 with a net worth of $1.91 billion was the youngest billionaire on the list.
Bengaluru-based Byju’s is a school learning app for students across age groups with programs in both English and Hindi.
Launched in 2015, the app has over 35 million registered students and 2.4 million annual paid subscriptions. The company recently announced it had tripled its revenue to $296 million AUD in FY 18-19 (Indian financial year is from April to March).
In March this year, the company secured over $44 million in funding for global expansion, which took the company’s value over $5 billion.
The company recently took over as Indian Cricket Team’s official sponsor until March 31, 2022.
Forbes said the list was compiled using shareholding and financial information obtained from the families and individuals, stock exchanges, analysts and India’s regulatory agencies.
Byju Raveendran, Founder and CEO of BYJU'S learning app chat, photographed during an interview with Mint. Source: Hemant Mishra/Mint via Getty Images
‘Public fortunes were calculated based on stock prices and exchange rates as of September 27. Private companies were valued based on similar companies that are publicly traded,’ it said.
