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Mark Zuckerberg, Rihanna and Bill Gates are some of Mukesh Ambani's guests.
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30 minutes
Mark Zuckerberg, Rihanna and Bill Gates are among the guests at the pre-wedding gala of one of the sons of Mukesh Ambani, Asia's richest man.
Some of the world's most influential people have arrived in the Indian state of Gujarat to take part in an extraordinary three-day party starting this Friday that will bring together nearly 1,200 guests.
According to Forbes, Ambani, 66, is currently the 10th richest man in the world with an estimated net worth of $115 billion.
The businessman is the president, CEO and largest shareholder of Reliance Industries, India's largest private company with interests in petrochemicals, oil and gas, telecommunications, retail and financial services.
The conglomerate owns one of the largest oil refinery complexes in the world.
His three children are involved in some of the group's companies.
Eldest son Akash is now chairman of Reliance Jio; his daughter Isha is in charge of financial services and retail; and his youngest son Anant, who is getting married in July, is in the energy business.
The billionaire's childhood
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Mukesh Ambani is the richest man in Asia and the tenth richest in the world.
Mukesh Ambani was born in Yemen and grew up in India after his family moved into a chawl, a low-rent communal building in Mumbai.
He came from a humble background and was one of the four children of Dhirubhai Ambani, a businessman who founded Reliance as a small textile company in 1966.
Looking back, Ambani often says that living on a shoestring in his early childhood gave him an advantage over other entrepreneurs who didn't have to work their way up from the bottom.
The family business began to prosper rapidly and the family moved from the chawl where they lived to a wealthy neighborhood in Bombay.
However, because their father didn't want his children to grow up too spoiled, he hired a tutor whose job it was to take the children on daily “trips” through low-income areas.
“It was one of the best things that happened to me in my life”Ambani told The New York Times.
The expansion of an empire
With a degree in chemical engineering from the University of Bombay, Ambani traveled to the United States to pursue a master's degree at Stanford University.
He dropped out of school midway after his father asked him to return to India to take care of a business.
His father, who did not finish high school, postulated this True learning comes from experience, not academic enclaves.
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Mukesh Ambani's children have a stake in the business conglomerate.
Back in India in the early 1980s, he worked in a village setting up a polyester factory.
Those who know him say that with the completion of the work he took an important place within the company founded by his father.
At this time, Reliance was becoming a rapidly growing company, opening up new areas of business, gaining power and placing greater emphasis on emerging industries.
The eldest son of a traditional Indian family, Ambani helped the company expand into the petrochemical sector, then into the energy sector (gas, oil and crude oil refining) and later into telecommunications.
The businessman usually thanks his father for giving him “complete freedom” to start a business.
After their father's death in 2002, Mukesh and his younger brother Anil fought over the family empire until, after a tough battle, the companies were divided. Mukesh took over the gas, oil and petrochemical units.
Years later, in the 2010s, the businessman founded Jio Platforms, a subsidiary of the family company specializing in telecommunications and e-commerce.
Recently, in August 2023, Jio Financial Services, the financial arm of the conglomerate, went public.
The billionaire and owner of the Mumbai Indians cricket team lives in a 27-story apartment building in Mumbai.
“Throw the house out the window”
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Subtitle,
Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla at the party.
According to local press reports, Ambani visits Hindu temples on his business trips, dislikes Western clothing, enjoys watching Bollywood films, speaking Gujarati with his family and eating Indian street food.
Unlike other billionaires who tend to party more discreetly, the Indian tycoon prefers to go “all out” and let the whole world know about it.
In fact, the party he organized in honor of his son is part of a family tradition of large and luxurious celebrations.
In 2018, singer Beyoncé performed at her daughter Isha's pre-wedding celebrations in the Indian city of Udaipur.
Former US Secretaries of State Hillary Clinton and John Kerry, among others, were invited to this event.
Public figures such as BlackRock co-founder Larry Fink, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Ivanka Trump are also invited to this gala.
Guests are scheduled to visit an animal rescue center in Jamnagar and, according to Portal, the dress code for the visit is as follows “Jungle fever.”
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