Industrialist Mukesh Ambani remains India’s richest person with a sharp surge of 30 per cent in his net worth to USD 26 billion, pushing his global rank to 21st on a worldwide rich list topped by Bill Gates.
The total number of billionaires from India has risen to 111, consolidating the country’s third position after China and the US, according to Hurun Global Rich List 2016, a ranking of the US dollar billionaires currently found in the world.
Bill Gates, retained the top spot with a fortune of USD 80 billion. “Gates has become the first person alive to have created a USD 100 billion fortune, having given away more than USD 20 billion to date,” the report said.
In the overall list, Gates was followed by Warren Buffett with a net worth of USD 68 billion further followed by Amancio Ortega with USD 64 billion net worth in the third place.
Jeff Bezos, with USD 50 billion and Carlos Slim Helu with USD 53 billion made it to the top five billionaires in the world.
The world’s billionaires grew by 99 to 2,188 individuals, which is a new world record and which is 50 per cent more than 2013.
Meanwhile, India consolidated its position in the third place with 111 billionaires, 14 more than last year.
“The combined wealth of the Indian billionaires shot up by 16 per cent to USD 308 billion and the average age was 64,” the report added.
Besides Ambani, the Indians who got featured in the coveted list include Dilip Shanghvi ranked 46th with a net worth of USD 18 billion, followed by Pallonji Mistry (rank 69, USD 13 billion), Shiv Nadar (rank 78, USD 12 billion), Cyrus S Poonawalla (rank 149, USD 8.1 billion), Uday Kotak (rank 152, USD 8 billion), Azim Premji (rank 155, USD 7.7 billion).
Sector-wise, manufacturing, pharma and tech were the sectors that minted most number of billionaires with 22, 20 and 15 super rich people, respectively.
In terms of cities, Mumbai was home to most of the Indian billionaires.
Wealth calculations are a snapshot of January 15, 2016.