Reliance Industries Ltd chairman Mukesh Ambani remained the richest Indian on Forbes list for the 14th straight year, continuing since 2008. Mukesh Ambani added $4 billion to his wealth in the last one year, retaining the top position with a net worth of $92.7 billion, according to Forbes 100 richest Indians list, which was released on Thursday. The 100 richest Indians grew their combined wealth to $775 billion; they added $257 billion, a 50 per cent gain, over the 2020 listing.
Gautam Adani retained the second position, by nearly tripling his fortune to $74.8 billion from $25.2 billion in 2020, as shares of all his listed companies soared. It may be noted that in 2020, the gap between Mukesh Ambani and Gautam Adani’s wealth was $63.5 billion. This has now narrowed down to $17.9 billion. Gautam Adani added $49.5 billion to his wealth in 2021. According to Forbes, Gautam Adani is responsible for almost a fifth of the increase in the wealth of India’s 100 richest this year.
HCL Technologies’ Shiv Nadar followed on the third spot with a $31 billion wealth. Radhakrishna Damani, investor and founder of D’Mart retail chain, secured fourth position on the list, with a net worth of $29.4 billion. Damani has nearly doubled his wealth from $15.4 billion in 2020. Cyrus Poonawalla, the founder of Serum Institute of India, moved up to rank 5 this year. His total net worth grew to $19 billion in 2021 from $11.5 billion, a year ago.
The other top five on the list were ArcelorMittal’s Lakshmi Mittal, with a fortune of $18.8 billion; Savitri Jindal with a fortune of $18 billion; Uday Kotak with a net worth of $16.5 billion; and Shapoorji Pallonji’s Pallonji Mistry with a net worth of $16.4 billion. Kumar Mangalam Birla moved up to 10th rank from 14th last year. His net worth soared to $15.8 billion, $7.3 billion more than what it was last year.
According to Forbes, the six newcomers on this year’s list include Ashok Boob (rank 93; $2.3 billion) of Clean Science and Technology; Deepak Mehta (rank 97, $2.05 billion) of Deepak Nitrite, and Yogesh Kothari (rank 100, $1.94 billion) of Alkyl Amines Chemicals. The youngest billionaires on the list are Divya Gokulnath of Byju’s (rank 47, $4.05 billion), and Nikhil Kamath of Zerodha Broking (rank 86, $2.59 billion), both aged 35.
Billionaires who lost the most wealth this year compared to last year are Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, who saw her wealth decline $0.7 billion or 15.22% to $3.9 billion. Others include P.V. Ramprasad of Aurobindo Pharma (rank 90, $2.45 billion), Gupta Family of Lupin (rank 75, $2.82 billion), and Reddy Family of Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories (rank 69, $3.01 billion), according to Forbes. The public fortunes were calculated based on stock prices and exchange rates of 17 September 2021.
