Starting a business is not a good thing. Especially when you don’t have money. For most of the 20th century, India was in financial trouble: either because of British rule or after many wars. However, this did not prevent these famous Indian traders from fighting to implement their ideas. Of course, some people on the list already belong to wealthy families, but these people came here because they turned the family businesses of the past into something else; the other inputs are the ones they have made the most themselves.
1. Dhirubhai Ambani
Dhirubhai Ambani, born in Chorwadu, Junagadh District, has long been one of India’s largest trade names. Born as a teacher at a village school, friends and relatives remember him as more ambitious and fearless risky. At the age of 16, Ambani moved to Yemen, where he sold petroleum products. His sons Mukesh and Anil were born in Yemen at that time. However, Dhirubhai Ambani soon returned to India to start his own business. He started a textile business with his second cousin Champaklal Damani.
However, the two later divorced due to different behaviors and attitudes. In 1966, Ambani founded Reliance Commercial Corporation, which later became Reliance Industries in 1973. Earlier in this early phase, it launched the “Vimal” brand, which sold polyester material for saris, scarves. , clothes and so on. Vimal soon became a household and a favorite with buyers. Confidence soon spread to other industries, including telecommunications and petrochemicals. At the time of his death in 2002, Reliance Industries became one of the leading companies in India due to market capitalization.
2. J R D Tata
Jehangir Ratanji Dadabhoy Tata, born into the wealthy Persian family of the famous merchant Ratanji Dadabhoy Tata and the French mother Suzanne Briere, was one of the most important Indian merchants of the 20th century. He spent most of his early years in France and England and did not give up his citizenship until 1929 to become an Indian citizen. He joined Tata Sons as a freelance student in 1925 and over the years has become a favorite of the company. In 1938, at the age of 34, he became chairman of the board and became the head of one of the largest companies in India. Under his leadership, the Tata Sons introduced many new paths. JRD Tata himself was the first licensed pilot in India and is often called the father of Indian civil aviation.
In 1932, he founded Tata Airlines, which later became Air India. He founded Tata Motors in 1945, Voltas in 1954, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) in 1968, Tata Salt in 1983 and Titan Industries in 1987. He is known for his pure behavior and non-involvement in corruption. In 1992, he was awarded the highest Indian civilian award, the Bharat Ratna.
3.Kunal Bahl
Kunal Bahl, born and raised in Delhi, is an Indian businessman and investor who founded the Indian e-commerce platform Snapdeal with his school friend Rohit Bansal. While Bahl holds a management degree from The Wharton School, Bansal has BTech from IIT Delhi. The pair launched Snapdeal as a daily trading platform in 2010, but later expanded it in 2011 to a full-fledged e-commerce company. Later, Snapdeal became one of the leading online brands in India and despite stiff competition from rival Flipkart and The Amazon, and Snapdeal is set to close at some point.
4. Radhakrishan Damani
Radhakishan Damani was born into the lower middle class Marwari family in Mumbai and is an Indian businessman best known for founding DMart. Damani initially had a ball trade, which he left after his father’s death. Damani’s father worked on Dalal Street. After his death, Damani also began working as a stockbroker and investor. He made huge profits in the 1990s thanks to Harshad Mehta, who was illegally stockpiling. Damani made a remarkable amount of money during this time and left the stock market in 2000. In 2002, it opened its first DMart in Powai, and in 2010 it had a chain of 25 stores. DMart currently has more than 230 stores and by 2020 Radhakishan Damani will be the 4th richest man in India.
5. Mukesh Jagtiani
Mukesh Jagtiani, also known as “Micky” Jagtiani, is an Indian businessman of Sindhi descent based in the United Arab Emirates. Jagtiani was born in Kuwait. He replaced his brother’s shop after the last one died and turned it into a baby store. In 10 years, it has grown to 6 stores. However, fortunately, the Gulf War took place in the 1990s and he had to move to Dubai. In Dubai, Jagtiani founded the Landmark Group, which eventually expanded to various fields, including fashion, electronics, furniture and hotels. The Landmark Group employs more than 45,000 people in India, the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. In 2008, Jagtiani entered the Forbes list of billionaires, and in May 2021 had a net worth of $ 3 billion.
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6. Dilip Shangvi
Dilip Shanghvi was born in the small town of Amreli in Gujarat and spent most of his early years in Kolkata, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in business from the University of Kolkata. His father owned a generic drug business in Kolkata, and Shanghvi began his career working for his father. He is currently considering making his own drugs, and in 1982 he founded Sun Pharmaceutical Industries with just Rs 10,000 (~ 1,75+ Rs by 2021). Initially, it produced only five psychiatric drugs, but eventually expanded to produce cardiology and gastroenterology products in the 1990s. In 1997, Sun bought the American company Caraco Pharma and in 2007 the Israeli company Taro Pharma. In 2014, Sun bought Ranbaxy to become India’s largest pharmaceutical company. In October 2021, Shanghvi was the 14th richest man in India with a net worth of more than $ 14 billion. Source: Wikimedia Commons
7.Ghanshyam Das Birla
GD Birla was born into an already wealthy merchant family in Birlas and may have been one of the most important members of the family, later founding several important companies and institutions that still represent his legacy. Birla’s family was one of the first cotton traders in India, and the family also traded in opium in China. Mr. D. Birla began his career as a jute broker and in 1918 founded Birla Jute Mills. Birla had to fight the British government, which favored European traders. However, during World War I, when the business of European merchants declined, Birl’s income increased. In the 1940s,
Birla founded Hindustan Motors. After the Quit India Movement in 1942, Birla considered setting up a commercial bank with Indian capital, creating the United Commercial Bank, which later became UCO Bank. Birla also founded BITS in her hometown of Pilani, which is now one of the most sought after educational institutions in India. He also founded the Technological Institute of Textiles and Sciences in Bhiwani.
8. Lakshmi Mittal
Lakshmi Mittal’s father, Mohanlal Mittal, was born into the Marwadi family and ran the Nippon Denro Ispat steel company. By limiting steel production in India, Lakshmi Mittal opened its first steel plant in Indonesia in 1978 and named it Ispat International as part of his father’s Ispat Industries. In the mid-1990s, however, Lakshmi separated from her father’s company due to several misunderstandings in the family. Mittal bought the state-owned steelworks of Trinidad and Tobago in 1989 and continued to purchase many properties over the next two decades, the largest of which was the acquisition of Arcelor in 2006 after transforming it into ArcelorMittal. ArcelorMittal is currently the second largest steel producer in the world.
9. Ritesh Agrawal
Ritesh Agarwal was born and raised in Orissa and was born into a family with modest circumstances. Ritesh left college but was selected for the Thiel Fellowship in 2013. He founded the Cheap Accommodation Portal, which he launched as OYO Rooms in 2013 after receiving a $ 100,000 grant as the winner of the Thiel Fellowship Program. By September 2018, Agarwal had raised $ 1 billion and in 2019 bought shares in OYO worth $ 2 billion, tripling its stake. Ritesh Agarwal is the youngest domestic billionaire after Kylie Jenner.
10. Azim Premji
Azim Premji was born into a well-established Gujarati Muslim business family and is an Indian businessman and philanthropist. In 1966, Premji had to travel home from Stanford University to study engineering when he learned of his father’s death. Back in India, Premji picked up Wipro, formerly known as Western Indian Vegetable Products. The company deals with hydrogenated oil, but Azim Premji has differentiated the company into other areas, including soaps and toiletries, lighting products, hydraulic cylinders and more. Premji took advantage of India’s IT boom to replace Wipro and enter the technology sector. manufacture of microcomputers. In 2001, he founded the Azim Premji Foundation, a non-profit organization. The foundation has under-worked over the past two decades to improve education in India, and in 2010 Premji promised to donate the same $ 2 billion. It is the highest gift in India for education.
Did you like our list of famous Indian Businessmen? Comment below if you think we have forgotten someone worth mentioning!
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