The Ambani's

The grand spectacle that is the Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) annual shareholder meetings have always been like a big fat Indian wedding. 40^th in the series was no different. Dhirubhai Ambani started in Naroda in 1967 with the philosophy of ‘Think Big, Think Different, Think Fast & Think Ahead’. Thanks to this thinking, RIL has been a beacon of India’s private sector progress since last four decades. 

Dhirubhai’s greatest achievement was that he showed Indians what was possible. With no degree from any exclusive schools and no family capital to bank on, he achieved what the elite sahibs of New Delhi could not- he built a modernistic, profitable, global enterprise in India. What's more, he detached millions of middle class Indians from depending on crony state socialism and brought them to the world of can-do capitalism by convincing them to load up on Reliance stock.

The 40^th meeting of RIL shareholders was celebration of the four decades of success and steady progress. Mukesh Ambani – first born son of Dhirubhai, following in his legendary father’s footsteps went over the company’s performance and gifted JIO to India. It’s not surprising that the company that launched the equity culture in India is disrupting the telecommunication landscape by giving aam aadmi access to an affordable high speed internet…a whole lot of it. 

Among many things, Mukesh shared a video paying homage to his late father. One noticeable element about that 30 minute video was how subtly, in RIL style, Anil Ambani – younger brother of Mukesh, didn’t appear in a single clip. It seemed like Dhirubhai only has one son. It’s true that after the split between the two brothers, Mukesh is scaling new heights every year, on the other hand Anil is selling his entities to pay off his corporate debt.  

So how is it that since 2005, Anil’s personal net worth is depleted to one tenth of Mukesh’s? Does this proves that Mukesh was ‘right’ in asking for the control of the combined RIL entity as a first born son? From this 12 years of separation, one think I can say is that Mukesh creates trends & Anil waits for them. Following 12 years might be different but for now, thanks to Mukesh, a JIO customer is surfing the web at high speed for peanuts. Mukesh, can at last say that he has changed India. And when you are Dhirubhai’s son that is what is expected of you*.   

*Own ‘non-market moving’ stakes in RIL & Anil’s entities.