Forbes’ List has Mukesh Ambani as India’s Richest

Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries, Mukesh Ambani looks during the opening plenary session of the World Economic Forum - India Economic Summit in Mumbai. (13/11/2011/INDRANIL MUKHERJEE/AFP/Getty Images)

Mukesh Ambani has retained his position as India’s wealthiest in the World’s Billionaires List by Forbes. The oil and gas tycoon is Forbes 22^nd wealthiest in the world with the top position maintained by Mexico’s Carlos Slim. It is Ambani’s sixth year in a row and Slim’s fourth.

Mukesh Ambani has a net worth of $21.5 billion (approx. Rs. 1.18 lakh crores) and his flagship company, Reliance Industries, remains the country’s most valuable enterprise. Started in the textiles business by Dhirubhai Ambani, Mukesh’s father, the Reliance Group now has interests in petrochemicals, oil & gas, telecom and retail. It is one of the largest publicly traded companies in India by market capitalization and is the second largest company by revenue.

Mukesh inherited his wealth along with his brother, Anil Ambani. Anil, with a personal fortune of $5.2 billion, is 233^rd richest in the world and 11^th in India. He is involved in asset management, insurance, telecom and entertainment.

Lakshmi Mittal, the Indian-born CEO of the world’s largest steel producer, Arcelor Mittal, is 41^st with a net worth of $16.5 billion. He was 21^st last year. Azim Premji, CEO of IT service provider, Wipro was 91^st on the list with $11.2 billion.

The 55 Indians in the Forbes’ list includes pharma entrepreneur Dilip Shanghvi (116), Essar Group’s billionaire brothers Shashi and Ravi Ruia (131), Kumar Birla (150), Savitri Jindal and family (155), telecom tycoon Sunil Mittal (173), HCL’s Shiv Nadar (182) and land baron Kushal Pal Singh (191).

Forbes’ 2013 list of the world’s richest people includes 1,426 billionaires, a record number, with a total net worth of $5.4 trillion, up from $4.6 trillion in the previous ranking.

Carlos Slim with a net worth of $73 billion is followed by Bill Gates with $67 billion, Spain’s Amancio Ortega with $57 billion, Warren Buffett with $53.5 billion and Larry Ellison with $43 billion. Slim made his fortune in telecom, retail, commodities, finance and energy.

The US leads the list with 442 billionaires, followed by Asia-Pacific with 386, Europe with 366, the Americas with 129 and the Middle East & Africa with 103.

Facebook founders, Dustin Moskovitz and Mark Zuckerberg are the youngest billionaires with $3.8 billion and $13.3 billion respectively; while, US banker and philanthropist David Rockefeller, 97, was the oldest, placed at 527th with $2.7 billion.