The weakening of the Rupee against the US Dollar and a volatile equity market may have triggered a shrinking of wealth for India's elite club of billionaires, but Mukesh Ambani (55), the energy tycoon who presides over the Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), continues to be the country's richest man with his personal fortune pegged at US$19.3 billion.

• Mukesh Ambani richest Indian with personal wealth of US$19.3 billion
• Steel baroness Savitri Jindal India's richest woman with a personal fortune of US$5.6 bn; Azim Premji richest South Indian
• Media magnates Indu Jain and Shobhana Bhartia among five richest Indian women
• Leading authority on China's wealthy launches HURUN INDIA RICH LIST 2012

Ambani tops the list of 59 Indian billionaires in dollar terms, leaving his nearest competitor, the London-based steel baron L N Mittal, by a clear margin of 2.4 billion dollars. Mittal, who heads Arcelor-Mittal steel conglomerate, has a wealth of 16.9 billion dollars, according to the inaugural Hurun India Rich Listthat was released today.

Steel baroness Savitri Jindal has emerged as India's richest woman with a personal fortune of US$5.6 billion while Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw of Biocon is the richest self-made woman with a personal wealth of US$600 million. Incidentally, she is the only self-made woman in the List. Otherwise, 62% of the individuals in the Hurun India Rich List are self-made.

For determining India's 100 wealthiest persons, the report says the minimum cut off mark for finding a place in the coveted list was US$330 million.

Hurun Report Inc, which prepared the list of India's richest people, is a leading research house and luxury publishing group based in Shanghai, China, and with offices across China and in London. It is widely considered the authoritative voice on the richest in China and ranks the 1000 richest individuals in that country.

Rupert Hoogewerf (right), Hurun Report Chairman and Chief Researcher said, "The stories of the people on the Hurun India Rich List tell the story of business in modern India."

Of the Top 100 of the Hurun India Rich List, 52 saw their wealth shrink, and the shrinkage was by over 25% for 21 of them. "This was mainly due to the 12% depreciation of the Rupee against the US Dollar, which negated the appreciation in India's stock markets," said Anas Rahman Junaid of GyanMagnus Associates, Hurun Report's chief Indian research partner.

In terms of personal fortune, Ambani and Mittal are followed by Azim Premji (Wipro, 12.3 billion dollars), Dilip Shanghvi (Sun Pharmaceuticals, 8.5 bn dollars), Pallonji Mistry (engineering and construction giant Shapoorji Pallonji & Co, 7.9 bn dollars), Shashi & Ravi Ruia (Essar Energy, 7.2 bn dollars) and Adi Godrej (Godrej Group, 6.9 bn dollars).

The other four who make the list of Top 10 billionaires are Kushal Pal Singh (DLF, 6.3 bn dollars), Kumara Mangalam Birla (Grasim Industries, 5.8 bn dollars), Shiv Nadar (HCL Technology, 5.7 bn dollars) and Sunil Mittal (Bharti Airtel, 5.7 bn dollars).

The Hurun India Rich Listis a snapshot of wealth as on September 22, 2012. The rate of exchange to the US dollar was INR 54.

Men dominate the List with just 5% of the list occupied by women. Among the five richest Indian women, Savitri Jindal is followed by Indu Jain (Bennett Coleman, 1.7 bn dollars), Anu Aga (Thermax, 690 million dollars), Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw (Biocon, 600 million dollars) and Shobhana Bhartia (Hindustan Times, 490 million dollars).

The list has some interesting nuggets of information. For instance, Mumbai is home to 36 of India's Richest 100, followed by Delhi and Bengaluru with 22 and 15, respectively. Also, five of the Top 100 are based outside of India and they are led by L N Mittal in London. In all, 74 individuals hail from North India, 21 from the South and 5 from overseas. Azim Premji is the richest South Indian.

The youngest person on the list is Shivinder Mohan Singh at 37 years old while the oldest, Keshub Mahindra, is 89 years old. The average age of the Top 100 is 62 years while the average age of the Top 10 is 65 years.

Manufacturing has emerged as the main source of wealth of the Hurun India Rich List, followed by pharmaceuticals, real estate, infrastructure, energy and technology.

Generic drugs tycoon Habil Khorakiwala of Wockhardt saw a more than trebling of his income year on year, the best performer on the Hurun List. The Indian stock exchanges were the preferred place to list, with 84% of the Hurun India Rich List, followed by London and Singapore.

As for India's richest entrepreneurs in terms of geographical regions, Mukesh Ambani is richest in Mumbai, K P Singh in Delhi, Azim Premji in Bengaluru, Benu Gopal Bangur (Kolkata), Kalanithi Maran (Chennai) Gautam Adani (Ahmedabad), Rahul Bajaj (Pune), Murali Divi (Hyderabad), Ramesh Agarwal (Bhopal) and Kapil and Rahul Bhatia (Gurgaon).

The richest Indians overseas are L N Mittal (London), Micky Jagtiani (Dubai) and Bhupendra Kumar Modi (Singapore).

Among the rich whose wealth was adversely affected in 2012 were Mukesh Ambani, L N Mittal, Shashi Ruia and Ravi Ruia, Kumara Mangalam Birla's flagship company Hindalco and telecom tycoon  Sunil Mittal.

Those whose fortunes were on the upswing this year included Azim Premji, Pharma King Dilip Shanghvi (Sun Pharma), construction tycoon Pallonji Mistry and technology entrepreneur Shiv Nadar (HCL).

Hurun India Rich List 2012 - The Top 10



About Hurun Report

Established as a research unit in 1999 by British chartered accountant Rupert Hoogewerf, Hurun Report Inc. has grown on the back of the Hurun China Rich List, a list which ranks the 1000 richest individuals in China. As the Chinese entrepreneurs have grown in the past decade, Hurun Report has expanded to include a Global Rich List in 2012 and – for the first time – an India Rich List, allowing for comparisons between two of the most dynamic economies in the world.

Hurun Reportis a leading research house and luxury publishing group based in Shanghai, China. Hurun Report Inc. has a stable of four luxury magazines, the Hurun Research Institute and an active business events division targeting China's entrepreneurs and high net worth individuals.

The flagship Hurun Report magazine is published monthly and reaches the households of 110,000 proven wealthy Chinese individuals and their advisers.

Hurun Report Inc. also publishesHorse & Polo, The Schools Guide Series and Wings & Water. For further information, see www.hurun.net

Methodology

The Hurun India Rich List is a snapshot of wealth on 22 September 2012. Non-listed companies were valued by comparison with their listed equivalents using prevailing industry transaction comparable such as earnings multiple, revenue multiple, statistical analysis using market indices. The rate of exchange to the US dollar was INR 54. Hurun Report would like to thank our chief Indian research partners GyanMagnus Associates, led by Anas Rahman Junaid.

Valuing the wealth of India's richest is as much an art as it is a science.  Our team of researchers has been sifting through volumes of publically available data on the top Indian entrepreneurs. The result is the first Hurun India Rich List.  No, it is not perfect.  We have missed off people that have gone to extraordinary lengths to keep their names off public records, but it is nonetheless, a serious attempt to rank and understand the changes going through the Indian economy.