Record 185 Dollar Billionaires Worth $1.2 Trillion

WEALTH CREATION is so integral to growth and capitalism that it is often one of the truest indicators of a nation’s economic glide path. Fortune India’s much anticipated annual rich list provides the most accurate and authentic insight into the changing fortunes of the country’s richest individuals.

In this 2024 edition, India now has a record 185 dollar billionaires. Together, they are worth an astounding $1.2 trillion, roughly equivalent of one-third of India’s GDP. The country added 29 new dollar billionaires in the past year. That is remarkable since it comes in the midst of global economic turbulence, depreciating rupee, wars, disruptions and looming recession.

As V. Keshavdev puts it so succinctly in the lead piece on India’s Richest, this phenomenal growth in wealth is more than just a numerical triumph — it’s a resounding affirmation of India’s economic dynamism juxtaposed against a turbulent macro-economic and geo-political environment.

Don’t miss our special presentation on India’s celeb tax payers this year — from Shah Rukh Khan to Kiara Advani.

Meanwhile, medical tourism is making a strong comeback. The Bureau of Immigration data says foreign tourist arrivals for medical needs bounced back from 1.83 lakh in 2020 to 4.75 lakh in 2022. In 2023, in just the January-October period, India had 5.04 lakh medical tourists. But that data does not capture medical tourists in states/UTs. Rating agency Crisil estimates that 2024 will see 7.3 million medical tourists, the highest ever.

And for a reason. If a hip replacement surgery costs $50,000 in the U.S., $14,120 in Korea, in India it costs $7,000. If a knee replacement in the U.S. costs $ 50,000, $19,800 in Korea, it’s $6,200 in India. A heart bypass costs $5,200 in India against $144,000 in the U.S. Medical Tourism Index by the Medical Tourism Association ranks India at 10th among 46 global destinations. In facilities and services, India ranks fourth as the country attracts patients for cancers, organ transplants, bone marrow transplants, heart diseases, orthopaedics, and neuroscience. “In the next few years, India will be the medical destination of choice, even for persons from developed economies,” says Prathap C. Reddy, founder-chairman, Apollo Hospitals. Read how that’s playing out in P.B. Jayakumar’s story.

In the automobile industry, the entry level car market is going through existential crisis with sales nosediving — in fact, halving — from nearly 3 lakh units a year in FY20 to barely 1.52 lakh units in FY24. Players such as Hyundai, Tata Motors and Mahindra & Mahindra have exited the entry-level segment, while Maruti is braving on with its models Alto K10 and S-Presso. With the bulk of the market (59.7%) moving up to the utility vehicles segment, rightly or wrongly, this trend is being seen as the coming of age of India’s automobile industry. Is this a permanent trend or a consequence of the stress on the middle class since Covid? We would know in due course but for the moment the once bustling segment is a pale shadow of itself with few models and even fewer innovations.

Rukmini Rao engaged hospitality major Accor’s chairman & CEO Sébastien Bazin in an interesting conversation on luxury hospitality and its emerging business models.