Anil Agarwal

Founder of Vedanta. Built a $30B+ mining and natural-resources conglomerate by acquiring distressed and state-owned assets across five decades.

Born in Patna, Bihar in 1954, Anil Agarwal left for Bombay at 19 to trade in scrap copper. He acquired his first manufacturing business in 1976 and founded Sterlite Industries in 1986. Through the privatization of BALCO (2001) and Hindustan Zinc (2002), the LSE listing of Vedanta Resources (2003), and the Cairn India acquisition (2011), he assembled what became one of the largest natural-resources groups in India. On 1 May 2026, Vedanta Limited demerged into five separately listed companies — Aluminium, Oil & Gas, Power, Iron & Steel, and the residual base-metals business.

Notable achievements

• Founded Sterlite Industries (1986) — went on to become the largest non-ferrous metals producer in India.
• Acquired 51% of Bharat Aluminium Co (BALCO) from the Government of India in 2001 (~₹551.5 cr).
• Acquired 26% of Hindustan Zinc (HZL) from the Government of India in 2002 (~₹445 cr).
• Took Vedanta Resources public on the London Stock Exchange in December 2003 — the first Indian company on the LSE main board.
• Acquired controlling stake in Cairn India from Cairn Energy in 2010–2011 (~$8.7B).
• Engineered the May 2026 demerger of Vedanta Limited into five separately listed companies.
• Pledged to give back at least 75% of his personal wealth, renewed publicly in January 2026.

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