Ambani Wedding: The Need for State-Regulation in Indian Capitalism | Gilbert Sebastian

The wedding of Anant Ambani, the youngest son of Mukesh Ambani, the richest business tycoon in Asia, during July 12 through 14, 2024 and the pre-wedding ceremonies spread over six months before that, have opened a window to the glaring inequality in Indian society. The vulgar display of wealth in the gaudy extravaganza became a cruel joke in the face of the mass impoverishment of millions of people in a country that houses the largest number of poor people in the world. It became a series of elite networking events and exposed the cringing deference to money power, of prominent politicians and celebrities worldwide as they queued up to greet the groom Anant Ambani, the youngest son of Mukesh Ambani and the bride Radhika Merchant who herself is the Chief Executive of a major firm Encore Healthcare, Mumbai.

The Event

Global billionaires Bill Gates of Microsoft, Mark Zuckerberg of Meta and celebrities like the Pop Singer Rihanna, former US President Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump attended the Pre-Wedding reception at Jamnagar in Gujarat, a city centred around the biggest oil refinery in the world, owned by Mukesh Ambani. Justin Bieber received $10 million remuneration for his performance in a pre-wedding performance and Rihanna received $8-9 million, reports say. The Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, former UK Prime Ministers Tony Blair, Boris Johnson, US media personalities Kim and Khloé Kardashian, actor and professional wrestler John Cena, US singer and actor Nick Jonas, many Bollywood superstars, Indian politicians across different political parties from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Mamata Banerjee, Akhilesh Yadav and Laloo Prasad Yadav attended the wedding ceremony in Mumbai. Rahul Gandhi, the leader of the Congress party was the notable exception who refused to attend the marriage. Prime Minister Modi calls him ‘Balak Buddhi’ (childish brain) and a beneficiary of dynastic politics. But he was taking on the role of the child who called the emperor naked and in fact, he belongs to the dynasty of an anti-colonial freedom fighter.

The Wealth of Mukesh Ambani

As estimated by Forbes (2023), Mukesh Ambani the owner of Reliance Industries has an accumulated real-time wealth of $116.7 billion. Antilia, his 27-floor house in Mumbai costs around Rs. 15,000 crore. It has 400,000 sq. ft. area, three helipads, hanging garden, and much more. The richest man in the country also has hegemony over the production of ideas as he controls 72 television channels across India. Gautam Adani is the second richest billionaire in the country with $82.1 billion and is known to be even closer to PM Modi.

Poverty & Inequality in India

World Inequality Report (2022) notes that the chasm between the rich and the poor in India now is the highest ever i.e., even higher than what it was during the colonial period.

Since the Covid-19 days of 2020, the Government of India (GoI) has been providing subsidized ration of food grains to 81.35 crore poor people under the National Food Security Act (NFSA). This has been made free since early 2023. This could be taken as a proxy indicator of the extent of distress among the common people in the country since the GoI has not been releasing socio-economic data in recent years.

Oxfam Report (2023) titled, Survival of the Richest: The India Story says, “The top 1 percent in India now owns more than 40.5 percent of total wealth in 2021 while the bottom 50% of the population (700 million) has around 3 per cent of total wealth.â€

According to a research by Pragati Gramodyog Evam Samaj Kalyan Sansthan (PGS), owing to social pressure, more than 60 per cent of Indian families turn to moneylenders to borrow money for wedding ceremonies. We know that Sraddh (death ceremonies) are yet another source of debt bondage. In such a social situation, far from the ideal of ‘simple living, high thinking’, the Ambanis have projected a wrong example of opulent marriage festivities for their fellow Indians aired through all their 72 television channels.

The Face of ‘Corporate Hindutva’

The widening of inequalities in the country has proceeded apace with the aggressive promotion of a renewed policy of divide and rule between the Hindu majority on the one hand and the Muslim and Christian religious minorities on the other. Unabashed hate speech and even call for genocide against Muslims have gone on with impunity over the last decade as part of the project apparently intended to turn Muslims into second class citizens in the country. Indian capitalism over the last decade could safely be broadly designated as ‘neoliberal Hindutva’ and ‘corporate Hindutva’ in particular. Mukesh Ambani is known to have contributed $300,000 towards building the Ram temple on the long-disputed site at Ayodhya and Qwik Supply Chains with indirect connections to Ambani’s Reliance has purchased anonymous electoral bonds worth $50 million. Electoral bonds were subsequently ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. As Yogendra Yadav says, “This is the most brazen rule of crony capitalism India has ever witnessed.†During the pre-wedding ceremonies, the domestic airport of Jamnagar was turned into an international airport with lavish government support. During the wedding ceremony, in Mumbai, police declared it a public event and caused huge traffic snarls. Traffic restrictions in a key Mumbai district for four days raised public ire. For people near the Bandra-Kurla Complex (BKC), it was work from home for a couple of days.

Taking Stock

An article by Sonia Faleiro in New York Times on 17 March 2024 titled, ‘The spectacle of the Ambani Wedding Event Reveals India’s Inequality’ argued that the week-long pre-wedding ceremony was the most ostentatious that the modern world has ever seen. She says that it was reminiscent of the 1911 durbar or royal reception when King George V was proclaimed the Emperor of India. She says that it symbolized the rise of oligarchs in Modi’s India.

The glitter and glamour of the whole wedding extravaganza reminds us of the lyrics of the classic Malayalam song by Yousef Ali Kecheri: “Even if marriage is made in heaven, life will remain confined to the earth.â€

Breach of the Promise Given by the Indian Constitution

The new India sends us shock and awe at the breach of promise that the Indian Constitution has given. The Preamble which is the very vision of the Indian Constitution visualised India as a “Sovereign, Socialist, Secular, Democratic Republic†.

The Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSP) in Part IV of the Indian Constitution says, “39. The State shall, in particular, direct its policy towards securing—

(c) that the operation of the economic system does not result in the concentration of wealth and means of production to the common detriment†.
However, the DPSP are not binding principles which are enforceable or justiceable in courts of law. They are only guiding principles to those holding the reins of State power. Therefore, it has been argued that the super-luxurious extravaganza was not illegal per se but unethical.

Need for Regulation

Ambani supporters laud the family for providing Bhandara (food consecrated in temple) feasts to thousands of commoners of Mumbai. However, critics are thoroughly dissatisfied with this Bhandara model of charity.

T M Thomas Isaac, former Finance Minister of Kerala noted on X, “Legally it maybe their money but such ostentatious expenditure is a sin against mother earth and (the) poor†. He called for taxing such “obscene†spending.

Brazil, as the President of G-20, is pushing for a 2% tax on the super-rich individuals holding wealth over $1 billion. If only the public exchequer benefits, we can have development and welfare. India has been one of the most unequalizing countries, particularly over the last 9 years ending 2023 according to a Working Paper titled, ‘Income and Wealth Inequality in India, 1922-2023: The Rise of Billionaire Raj authored by Nitin Kumar Bharti, et al along with Thomas Piketty. The say, “[B]y 2022-23, top 1% income and wealth shares (22.6% and 40.1%) are at their highest historical levels and India’s top 1% income share is among the highest in the world.†They also suggest a ‘super tax’ on the uber-rich to fight inequalities and give “additional fiscal space†to the Government of India to enhance its expenditure “on essential social expenditures (health, education, nutrition) which have been historically low compared to global standards, including other countries at similar income levels†.

What we would like to put forward is a very moderate argument. We need to have a regulated capitalism, not a largely unregulated one, as we have in India. We do not have the massive inheritance tax to the tune of 50%, as there is in several countries in the US and Europe, nor do we have special tax on the super-rich individuals like Ambani and Adani, which is now being proposed worldwide. India usually gives land allotment to corporate houses for one life-time i.e., 90 years as against China which gives it only for 30-40 years. In February 2023, the Union government informed Lok Sabha that 10.09 lakh crore was written off by Scheduled Commercial Banks during the four-year period ending Financial Year 2021-22. Over the last 7 years, State Bank of India, the biggest banking network in the country granted a "haircut" (huge concession) to 63% of the bad debt (Non-Performing Assets) of big defaulters (Rs. 100 crore or more) worth a total of Rs. 1.38 lakh crore, without revealing the names of the defaulters, recovering only 11 per cent in the process. Will such concessions be available to common people whose assets are usually confiscated mercilessly by banks when they default on loans? Economic fugitives like Vijay Mallya, Lalit Modi, Nirav Modi, Subrata Roy (of Sahara India) fled the country. Tens of thousands of crore rupees was taken away by such absconders. It is not only deregulation but bailouts are also part and parcel of contemporary capitalism, as Noam Chomsky rightly argues.

The YouTuber on ‘Think India’ argues that Ambani’s wedding extravaganza can enhance the soft power of India and is a genius business strategy to promote Indian business interests. What an obfuscation of reality about a country synonymous with its poverty, as if on a camera obscura! Reports say that Mukesh Ambani has spent around 5000 crore rupees on his youngest son’s marriage. So the expenditure is around 0.5 per cent of his total wealth. Even Princess Diana’s marriage in the United Kingdom had cost only 1,400 crore rupees according to ’Financial Times’. So why shouldn’t the government levy a luxury tax on such grand gala celebrations in a country with 228.9 million (22.89 crore) poor people, as per the Oxfam estimates of 2023? The world today witnesses aggressive strides of neo-liberal capitalism and people’s movements across the world are on their back foot. A regulated capitalism could be a good step-forward towards a ‘socialism-oriented path of development’ in the future.

(Author: Dr. Gilbert Sebastian (gilbertseb[at]gmail.com) is an Assistant Professor at the Department of International Relations & Politics, Central University of Kerala, Kasaragod. The views expressed are personal)