The Billionaire Raj

A colorful and revealing portrait of the rise of India’s new billionaire class in a radically unequal society India is the world’s largest democracy, with more than one billion people and an economy expanding faster than China’s. But the rewards of this growth have been far from evenly shared, and the country’s top 1% now own nearly 60% of its wealth. In megacities like Mumbai, where half the population live in slums, the extraordinary riches of India’s new dynasties echo the Vanderbilts and Rockefellers of America's Gilded Age, funneling profits from huge conglomerates into lifestyles of conspicuous consumption. James Crabtree’s The Billionaire Raj takes readers on a personal journey to meet these reclusive billionaires, fugitive tycoons, and shadowy political power brokers. From the sky terrace of the world’s most expensive home to impoverished villages and mass political rallies, Crabtree dramatizes the battle between crony capitalists and economic reformers, revealing a tense struggle between equality and privilege playing out against a combustible backdrop of aspiration, class, and caste. The Billionaire Raj is a vivid account of a divided society on the cusp of transformation—and a struggle that will shape not just India’s future, but the world’s.

Just as WASPs, Irish-Catholics and Our Crowd Jews once made the ascent from immigrants to powerbrokers, it is now the Indian-American's turn. Citigroup, PepsiCo and Mastercard are just a handful of the Fortune 500 companies led by a group known as the "Twice Blessed." Yet little is known about how these Indian emigres (and children of emigres) rose through the ranks. Until now... The collapse of the Galleon Group--a hedge fund that managed more than $7 billion in assets--from criminal charges of insider trading was a sensational case that pitted prosecutor Preet Bharara, himself the son of Indian immigrants, against the best and brightest of the South Asian business community. At the center of the case was self-described King of Kings, Galleon's founder Raj Rajaratnam, a Sri-Lankan-born, Wharton-educated billionaire. But the most shocking allegation was that the éminence grise of Indian business, Rajat Gupta, was Rajaratnam's accomplice and mole. If not for Gupta's nose-to-the-grindstone rise to head up McKinsey & Co and a position on the Goldman Sachs board, men like Rajaratnam would have never made it to the top of America's moneyed elite. Author Anita Raghavan criss-crosses the globe from Wall Street boardrooms to Delhi's Indian Institute of Technology as she uncovers the secrets of this subculture--an incredible tale of triumph, temptation and tragedy.

A hilarious, touching and extraordinary fable from David Walliams, number one bestseller and fastest growing children’s author across the globey, with EXCLUSIVE audio and video from David Walliams

For a century the iconic Grand Raj Palace Hotel has welcomed the world's elite. From film stars to foreign dignitaries, anyone who is anyone stays at the Grand Raj. The last thing the venerable old hotel needs is a murder... When American billionaire Hollis Burbank is found dead - the day after buying India's most expensive painting - the authorities are keen to label it a suicide. But the man in charge of the investigation is not so sure. Inspector Chopra is called in - and discovers a hotel full of people with a reason to want Burbank dead. Accompanied by his sidekick, baby elephant Ganesha, Chopra navigates his way through the palatial building, a journey that leads him steadily to a killer, and into the heart of darkness . . . Baby Ganesh Agency InvestigationThe Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector ChopraThe Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the CrownThe Strange Disappearance of a Bollywood StarMurder at the Grand Raj Palace

Almost everyone in this world wants Wealth, Success and Happiness. From the perspective of the subconscious mind The Universe is an Extension of The Individual and it is the conscious mind that keeps thinking that one is a part of or belongs to the Universe. This book teaches you how to connect to the Universal Mind through your subconscious mind in order to fulfill your intentions and desires. After reading this book you will begin to understand that your hard work, your background, your ethnicity, your country, your family, your teachers and even You from the conscious state of mind plays less than 10% role in determining who you could become. It is the subconscious mind which plays 90% of the turns and events that will eventually enable you to realize your desires in realizing any dreams, including wealth. You begin to to understand the connection between you and the universe, and what you do as you merge deeper into your co-existence with everything around you. You will begin to realize that the current financial situation you are leading is an accumulation of thought patterns and memories imprinting it time and again, and chanelling itself to the Greater Universal Mind through waves emanating from your subconscious mind. This waves and vibrations emanating from your subconscious mind will be the determinant of the magnitude in financial success. Why financial success? Because you are in the material world and you are using your mind waves to bring about results of materialistic kind. You are already tasting everything in your thought, but you could not touch your thoughts because it is in immaterial form. So now you get it? Use your mind, connect to the Universal Mind and get what you want in the Material World. By proper activation of the thought pattern, you channel your desires to the Higher Mind and wait. That is all it takes. By this, you move the Hands of the Universe quicker and more effectively. You become active and proactive. So does the Universe that embodies you. Although many of us are successful in career, we still find we are not living our dreams. Like Galileo Galilei once said, "We cannot teach people anything; we can only help them discover it within themselves." How true? If only we understand deeper...

Billionaires in World Politics shows how the privatization of politics assumes a new dimension when billionaires wield power in world politics, which requires a re-thinking of individual agency in International Relations. Structural changes (globalization, neoliberalism, competition states, and global governance) have generated new opportunities for individuals to become extremely rich and to engage in politics across borders. The political agency of billionaires is being conceptualized in terms of capacities, goals, and power, which is contingent upon the specific political field a billionaire is trying to enter. Six case studies explore the power of billionaires in their pursuit of security, wealth, and esteem. The chapter on security analyzes Raj Rajaratnam's relationship to the Tamil cause in Sri Lanka, and Sheldon Adelson's transnational electioneering in the Israel-Palestine conflict. Regarding the economy, the book studies how the Koch brothers' political protection of fossil fuels is affecting climate change mitigation, and how Rupert Murdoch's opinion-shaping is valorizing conservatism across borders. The chapter on social entrepreneurship and esteem examines the role of Bill Gates in the governance of global health and George Soros's attempts to build open societies as a 'stateless statesman'. An analytical conclusion evaluates the prior findings in order to address three major questions: Is it more appropriate to see billionaires as 'super-actors', or as a global 'super-class'? What is the relative power of billionaires within the international system? What does the power of billionaires mean for the liberal norms of legitimate political order?

* Our summary is short, simple and pragmatic. It allows you to have the essential ideas of a big book in less than 30 minutes. As you read this summary, you will discover how India's new billionaires have established themselves as leaders, transforming their country's economic and political world. You will also discover that : india is developing unevenly; there are growing disparities between individuals; the poorest suffer from the confrontation between politicians and billionaires; the Indian nation is mired in corruption; the super-rich are investing and defrauding at all levels in order to make as much money as possible. In 1947, the United Kingdom granted independence to India thanks to the perseverance of the wise Gandhi and his disciple Nehru. The latter took power and wanted a progressive industrialization of the nation, in the image of the emerging globalization. Gandhi, for his part, tried to warn his country against the dangers of this globalization: he wanted it to build itself and form its own identity. Unfortunately, the Mahatma was assassinated in 1948 and with him, the hope of a unified country. How did India, this country of extreme poverty, become the greatest unequal power in the world? *Buy now the summary of this book for the modest price of a cup of coffee!

What makes a company truly outstanding? What is the secret sauce of delivering successful results over multiple decades? What is common to Asian Paints, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank, Marico, Berger Paints, Page Industries and Astral Poly? They are Unusual Companies, built by Unusual Billionaires. This book tells the story of these seven companies, handpicked out of 5000 listed on the stock exchange. Built by visionary business leaders, they have delivered outstanding results for a decade and more. How did these companies do it? Why couldn’t this be replicated by other companies? What are they doing differently? Saurabh Mukherjea, bestselling author of Gurus of Chaos, delivers an exceptional book with lessons to learn from these seven businesses. Mukherjea tells you why focusing on the core business is central to corporate success and how a promoter giving up control to the top management could be a boon. He also explains how investors can generate market-beating investment returns from identifying companies such as these using a simple set of metrics. Packed with these learnings are riveting corporate stories of how Hindustan Unilever made an aggressive bid to buy Harsh Mariwala’s business, but had to sell a business to him in a few years, or how Page Industries found an innovative way to stop unionization at their manufacturing units. Other stories include the turnaround of Axis Bank and the boardroom coup that led to its chairman’s exit and how Vijay Mallya sold Berger Paints to the Dhingra brothers. This book is mandatory reading for anyone who wants to understand how business is done successfully in India.