New age Indian entrepreneurs enter the super-rich list, Ola founders the youngest

With the start-up boom, increasing number pf entrepreneurs are coming on board. So much so that they are entering the super-rich list too. The debutants include Ola founders Ankit Bhati, 28, and Bhavish Aggarwal, 29, who are also the youngest on the list. With their personal fortunes estimated at Rs 2,385 crore each, the duo are jointly ranked 238th.

While the top spots are occupied by the old players, Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani ranked numero uno with a net worth of Rs 1.6 lakh crore, the list also has some surprising new entrants. The Indian who posted the biggest gain in wealth over the past year is reported to be Dhiraj Rajaram, the 40-year-old founder of Bengaluru-based analytics firm Mu Sigma are some to state. Rajaram saw his personal fortune rise six-fold, to Rs 17,800 crore. His ranking has risen 127 spots to No. 38, according to the Hurun India Rich List for 2015.

There are 76 new faces among the 296 who made it to the Hurun India Rich List this year, with the cut-off level being personal wealth of Rs 1,600 crore. Apart from Ola's Bhati and Aggarwal, other prominent tech entrepreneurs on the list include Flipkart's Sachin Bansal, 34, and Binny Bansal, 34, whose estimated wealth of Rs 9,010 crore each puts them at the 85th spot, a rise of 58 positions. Snapdeal's Kunal Bahl, 32, is a new entrant, jumping straight to the 243rd spot with a wealth of Rs 2,314 crore.

Vijay Shekhar Sharma, 38, of mobile wallet and ecommerce firm Paytm, and Naveen Tewari, 39, of the mobile ad network InMobi are also a part of the list.

Most of these technology and internet companies have raised significant amounts of private equity capital at substantial valuations over the past year. Flipkart's latest fund raise valued the firm at $15 billion, and Snapdeal's valued it close to $5 billion. Most of the new-age startup founders are also exceptional in that they are self-made; 85% of those in the list are part of family businesses.

"Despite the weakening of the stock market and the rupee, the Hurun India Rich List expanded by 76 entrepreneurs, showing the resilience and dynamism of the Indian private sector," said Anas Rahman Junaid, India head, Hurun Report. The Hurun Report was started by researcher Rupert Hoogewerf. The first report, in 1999, was on the rich in China, and Hoogewerf has since been regularly bringing out a China rich list. The India initiative began two years ago.

At the top, Mukesh Ambani was followed by Dilip Sanghvi of Sun Pharma, S P Hinduja & family of the Hinduja Group, Shiv Nadar of HCL, and Pallonji Mistry of the Shapoorji Pallonji Group. For the first time, Wipro chairman Azim Premji fell off the top 5 rankings. He's now at the seventh spot, with his net worth plummeting 59% to Rs 51,900 crore.

(Image credits: Indiatimes)