Adani v Ambani: the battle of the tycoons

at Mundra, the biggest private port in India, it is possible, on a clear day, to spot the world’s largest oil refinery, 50km south across the Gulf of Kutch. In the early 1990s both sites in the state of Gujarat were malarial swamps and farmland. Today they are monuments to India’s economic promise—and to the tycoons who built them. and , both billionaires, have in recent years become the best-known faces of Indian business. To supporters, they are patriotic nation-builders, using their sway and resources to further India’s economic progress. To critics they are only in it for themselves. Their motivation seems to lie somewhere in between.The duo’s rising influence over is undisputed. Many observers now talk of the “ economy”. That is an exaggeration, but the combined revenues of the companies controlled by Messrs Adani and Ambani are equivalent to 4% of India’s . They are also responsible for 25% of the capital spending of listed non-financial firms at a time when overall investment has been subdued. “Never have we walked away from investing in India, never have we slowed our investments,” asserted Mr Adani at the annual meeting of his group on July 26th. Not to be outdone, Mr Ambani, at his own annual meeting on August 29th, pledged to double the size of Reliance, the conglomerate that he runs, adding “patriotism inspires and energises everything we do.”