Richest get richer by 50% on bull run

New Delhi: India's richest scale new heights with Forbes India estimating the wealth of 100 richest in the country at ao a record $775 billion, an increase of 50 per cent in the past one year. According to Forbes, more than 80 per cent of the listees saw their fortunes increase, with 61 adding $1 billion or more to their wealth.

Serum Institute founder, Vaccine billionaire Cyrus Poonawalla, has added a net worth of $19 billion to his wealth, as his company makes Covishield vaccine under license from AstraZeneca and has other Covid-19 vaccines under development.

Since 2008, Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), has topped the list of India's richest persons with a net worth of $92.7 billion as of 2021. Ambani recently outlined plans to pivot into renewable energy with a $10 billion investment by his diversified conglomerate. The 2nd position in the India's richest list went to infrastructure tycoon Gautam Adani, for the third year in a row. Adani is the biggest gainer in both percentage and dollar terms, as his fortune nearly tripled to $74.8 billion from $25.2 billion previously, as shares of all his listed companies soared.

Amongst the list, Saviriti Jindal secured 7th rank on the list, thus claiming the title of India's richest women with a wealth of $18 billion. The other wealthiest women who made it to the list are Havells India's Vinod Rai Gupta at rank 24 with net worth of $7.6 billion, USV's Leena Tewari at rank 43 with net worth of $4.4 billion. Biocon's Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw achieved an overall rank of 53, even though her net worth depleted to $3.9 billion in 2021.

Byju's co-founder 35-year-old Divya Gokulnath also made it to the list of 2021 Forbes India Rich List alongside her husband, the cofounder of Byju's Byju Raveendran.

Gokulnath is the youngest billionaire on the list for the second year running along with Zerodha Broking's Nikhil Kamath, also 35. At 73rd position, Mallika Srinivasan of the Amalgamations Family, the owners of Tractors and Farm Equipment Limited (TAFE), has her net worth at $2.89 billion.

Forbes India also lists six newcomers to its list with Ashok Boob claiming 93 on the top 100 with a net worth of $2.3 billion. His company Clean Science and Technology listed on Indian bourses in July. Chemical industrialist Deepak Mehta took 97th position with a wealth of $2.05 billion whereas Arvind Lal, Chairman of diagnostics chain Dr Lal PathLabs debuted on the list at 87 rank with a net worth of $2.55 billion after a pandemic-induced surge in testing caused shares of his company to double in the past year.

According to Forbes India, the top 100 billionaire list was compiled using shareholding and financial information obtained from the families and individuals, stock exchanges, analysts and India's regulatory agencies. India's IPO rush returned property magnate and politician Mangal Prabhat Lodha to the Forbes India list at 42 rank with wealth of $4.5 billion, following the April listing of his Macrotech Developers. Among the four other returnees is C Prathap Reddy, who, ranked 88th, is worth $2.53 billion wealth. His company Apollo Hospitals Enterprise is listed in India.