Ready, set, match: Artist Jagjot Singh Rubal painting portraits of Radhika and Anant in Amritsar ahead of their wedding. Anant is marrying his childhood sweetheart Radhika in a lavish three-day wedding beginning yesterday, an opportunity for his father Mukesh to showcase his place at the top of India’s corporate hierarchy. — AFP
Global celebrities, business tycoons and politicians began arriving in India’s financial capital to attend the wedding of the youngest son of Mukesh Ambani, Asia’s richest man, highlighting the billionaire’s staggering wealth and rising clout.
Anant Ambani, 29, is marrying his longtime girlfriend, Radhika Merchant, in what many have dubbed the wedding of the year.
The celebrations are taking place at the Ambani-owned Jio World Convention Centre in Mumbai and their family home and are the culmination of months of wedding events that featured performances by pop stars including Rihanna and Justin Bieber.
The four-day wedding celebrations begin with a traditional Hindu wedding ceremony followed by a grand reception through the weekend. The guest list includes former British prime ministers Tony Blair and Boris Johnson, Saudi Aramco CEO Amin H. Nasser, the Kardashians, Adele, Lana Del Rey, Drake and David Beckham, according to local media.
The Ambani family has not confirmed the guest list.
Police have imposed traffic diversions from yesterday to Monday around the wedding venue to handle the influx of guests who will be flying into the megacity of Mumbai, where heavy monsoon rains have caused flooding and flight disruptions for the past week.
The father of the groom, Mukesh, 66, is the world’s ninth richest man with a net worth of US$116bil (RM544bil), according to Forbes. He is also the richest person in Asia.
His Reliance Industries is a massive conglomerate, reporting over US$100bil (RM470bil) in annual revenue, with interests ranging from petrochemicals, and oil and gas to telecoms and retail.
The Ambani family owns, among other assets, a 27-storey private apartment building worth US$1bil (RM4.7bil) in Mumbai. It has three helipads, a 160-car garage and a private movie theatre.
Mukesh’s son Anant oversees the conglomerate’s renewable and green energy expansion. He also runs a 3,000-acre (about 1,200ha) animal rescue centre in Gujarat state’s Jamnagar, the family’s hometown.
The bride, Radhika, 29, is the daughter of pharmaceutical tycoon Viren Merchant and is the marketing director for his company, Encore Healthcare, according to Vogue.
The Ambani family’s pre-wedding celebrations have been lavish and star-studded.
In March, they threw a three-day pre-nuptial bash for his son with 1,200 guests including former world leaders, tech tycoons and Bollywood megastars, and performances by Rihanna, Akon and Diljit Dosanjh, a Punjabi singer who shot to international fame when he performed at Coachella.
The event was also attended by tech billionaires Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates.
It was the start of lavish months-long pre-wedding celebrations that have grabbed headlines and set off a social media frenzy.
In May, the family took guests on a three-day cruise from Italy to France which included Katy Perry singing her hit Firework and a performance by Pitbull, according to media reports.
The family also organised a mass wedding for more than 50 underprivileged couples on July 2 as part of the celebrations.
Last week, Justin Bieber performed for hundreds of guests at a private pre-wedding concert which included performances by Bollywood stars Alia Bhatt, Ranveer Singh and Salman Khan.
Mukesh also made headlines in 2018 when his daughter married because of the grand celebrations, with Beyoncé performing at the pre-wedding festivities.
Former US Secretaries of State Hillary Clinton and John Kerry were among those who rubbed shoulders with Indian celebrities and Bollywood stars in the western Indian city of Udaipur. — AP
