Mukesh Ambani still richest Indian for ninth year with $18.9b

Dubai - Ambani's younger brother, Anil, who ranks No. 29 with a net worth of $2.9 billion, also took a hit.

Industrialist Mukesh Ambani has been named India's richest for the ninth year in a row with a net worth of $18.9 billion even as his wealth dipped by $4.7 billion in a year, according to Forbes magazine's latest India rich list.
Ambani was followed by Sun Pharma's Dilip Shanghvi as the second-richest with a net worth of $18 billion. After a meteoric rise in the past few years, his wealth has remained static as Sun Pharmaceutical Industries bears the merger costs of its acquisition of rival Ranbaxy Industries. However, Sun remains India's most valuable drug company, while Wipro's Azim Premji retained his third-place spot with $15.9 billion. Premji has pledged 18 per cent of his stake in Wipro, India's third-largest outsourcer, to his charitable trust in addition to a 21 per cent stake already given.
Ambani's younger brother, Anil, who ranks No. 29 with a net worth of $2.9 billion, also took a hit. Falling shares of his group's companies more than halved his fortune from a year ago. The combined wealth of the brothers is down by more than $8 billion.
While the combined net worth of India's 100 richest remains largely unchanged at $345 billion as compared to $346 billion a year ago, there are 12 new faces this year.
Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart's co-founders Sachin and Binni Bansals made their debut at 86th position with a net worth of $1.3 billion each.

As many as 10 of them saw their net worth dip by over $1 billion each in one year.
Lakshmi Mittal, whose net worth dipped to $4.6 billion, slipped three places to eighth with $11.2 billion as his ArcelorMittal, the world's biggest steelmaker, got hit by rising imports from China.
In the top 10, the Hinduja brothers were ranked fourth with $15.9 billion, followed by Pallonji Mistry ($14.7 billion), Shiv Nadar ($12. 9 billion), the Godrej family ($11.4 billion), Lakshmi Mittal ($11.2 billion), Cyrus Poonawala ($7.9 billion) and Kumar Mangalam Birla ($7.8 billion).
Nine Gulf-based non-resident Indians found their way into the latest Forbes India Rich List. Micky Jagtiani, the head Dubai-based retail conglomerate Landmark Group, was 17th, while retail giant Lulu Group's managing director Yusuffali M.A. came 24th among the 100 wealthiest Indians.
 
Ravi Pillai, chairman of construction and hospitality giant RP Group, is ranked 40th; educationist and chairman of Gems-Varkey Group Sunny Varkey is 47th; Sunil Vaswani, head of Stallion Group, is 48th;  B.R. Shetty, head of NMC Healthcare Group ranks 66th; Azad Moopen, chairman of DM-Aster Healthcare Group is 81st; P.N.C. Menon, chairman of real estate developer Sobha Group came 91st; and Raghuvinder Kataria, chairman of Dubai's Kataria Holdings, is 100th.
The magazine said the Indian economy was estimated to grow seven per cent this year, but the wealth of many of India's 100 richest has declined due to the fall in the stock markets and depreciation of the rupee over the past one year.
Forbes said the list was compiled using shareholding and financial data obtained from families and individuals, stock exchanges, analysts and regulators. The ranking lists family fortunes including those shared among extended familes such as in the case of the Godrej and Bajaj families, while public fortunes were calculated on the basis of share price and exchange rates as on September 11.
The privately-held companies were valued on the basis of their peer group companies that are publicly listed.
- issacjohn@khaleejtimes.com

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