By Hannah Ellis-Petersen and Aakash Hassan
It wasn’t even the real wedding, just the pre-wedding party. But that didn’t stop India’s richest billionaire, Mukesh Ambani, whose son is set to marry the daughter of a millionaire, from throwing an affair so ostentatious that no one could question just how wealthy they are.
The pop star Rihanna was paid about $8m to perform. The catering alone cost $25m and the final bill for the glittering soiree, held in March, reportedly came in at about $150m.
Super-rich magnates such as Ambani were once a rare breed in India but now their numbers are increasing at a record pace. Last year, there were 200 Indians on the Forbes billionaires list, the most ever. India’s financial and film metropolis of Mumbai just overtook Beijing to become Asia’s “billionaire capital”, behind only London and New York.
To some, this growing cohort of the super-rich shows India has become an economic success story in the past decade of Narendra Modi’s government. The country is now regularly described as the world’s fastest-growing economy, with GDP growth in 2023 pegged at 7.6%, far higher than that in most western countries.
This story was originally published in theguardian.com. Read the full story here.
