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STREET
SMART URGE
TO SPLURGE A
CHECK ON PAY BILLIONAIRE
CLUB HIGHEST
PAY PACKETS METHODOLOGY
AND INDEX |
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In the film industry, there would be enough directors and actors who would be either there or closing in fast. Names like Amitabh Bachchan and Shahrukh Khan come easily to the mind. The former's actor wife, while filing her nomination papers for a Rajya Sabha seat in 2006, declared that her husband owned property worth Rs 190 crore and she had another Rs 37 crore worth of real estate in her name. Given the rise in the property valuations in the last one year... well, we could be talking of a good increase of 40 to 50 per cent in those valuations. And Bachchan, at that time, had stock investments worth Rs 134 crore.
Sports, however is still not greatly paying in India. Unlike Tiger Woods ($100 million and second in the Forbes richest celebrities list) or Michael Schumacher ($36 million) or Roger Federer ($29 million), cricketing icon Sachin Tendulkar is not there in the Forbes celebrity list. The only hint we have is the fact that he signed a Rs 100 crore deal with the WorldTel in 2001.
Surely, there would be many others who can join this list. There are stories about the splurging by Union Railway Minister Lalu Yadav during his second and third daughters' marriages. But then, in India one can seldom put any number to a minister's wealth. Alas, that is a serious loss to this story. • Business Standard • December 2007 |
In
other industries like pharma, there is Samprada Singh of Alkem who
started his tryst with drugs with a medical store in Bihar and now
is the chairman of a Rs 1,000 crore company. Then there's Sushil
Handa of the Rs 360 crore Claris life, whose company is likely to
be listed next year and US Vitamins' Prashant Tiwari and his wife.
Khan'
s Mannat in Bandra, Mumbai, on the other hand is estimated at between
Rs 70-100 crore. Artists like Husain, who signed a controversial
Rs 100 crore deal with Guru Swarup Srivastava, chairman of the Swarup
group of Industries, and Syed Haider Raza whose painting is selling
for Rs 8 crore each would also qualify easily for the billionaires
list. 
And
recently there has been news that Globosport, the sports marketing
and celebrity management agency founded by tennis player Mahesh
Bhupathy is on the verge of signing a Rs 100 crore deal with Yuvraj
Singh. Chess grandmaster Vishwanathan Anand is another one who is
reported to be worth over Rs 100 crore.