Gandhis grandsons are billionaires

The twin great grandsons of Mahatma Gandhi’s “fifth son” have become billionaires riding the draft of their uncle’s motorcycle business.

Anurang Jain’s net worth hit $1.1 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, after auto parts maker Endurance Technologies Ltd. soared 74 percent since its October initial public offering. His brother, Tarang, has a $1.1 billion fortune based on the valuation of closely held Varroc Group, which also makes components for motorcycles and cars.

Both companies have long counted their uncle’s Bajaj Auto Ltd. as their biggest customer.”I will be the first one to shout at them if I find any problem,” Rahul Bajaj, 78, said in a May 11 phone interview. “Bajaj Auto has always insisted on better quality and lower cost. Indeed, both had worked on cost and quality, otherwise they would not have grown.”

Bajaj, who recalls sitting in Gandhi’s lap and digging wells for the independence leader at his ashram, realized as a teenager that what propelled his family most wasn’t the spirit of non-violent political protest but a quest for success.

“People say, while you are a child, you think of being a policeman or a pilot,” Bajaj said in an interview with Harvard Business School in 2014. “I never thought of anything else: business, business, business.”

Since then, Bajaj transformed himself into the king of the Indian scooter industry and amassed a personal fortune valued at $4.2 billion, ranking him No. 433 on the Bloomberg index of the world’s 500 richest people.

Samir Shrimankar, a spokesman for the Bajaj Group, confirmed Rahul’s net worth, while Anurang’s was verified by Sunil Lalai, an Endurance spokesman. Varroc representatives didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Publicly traded Bajaj Auto, started by Rahul’s father and run by his son since 2005, is the group’s flagship business and India’s largest exporter of motorcycles and three-wheelers. The company is part of Bajaj Group, controlled by the billionaire and three cousins — Madhur, Niraj and Shekhar — through Bajaj Holdings & Investment.