Read about Subrata Roy net worth, age, wife, children, height, family, parents, salary and business career as well as other information you need to know.
Introduction
Subrata Roy was a well-known Indian businessman who was famous as the founder Sahara India Pariwar in 1978. His company oper ated a vast number of businesses such as Aamby Valley City, Sahara Movie Studios, Air Sahara, Uttar Pradesh Wizards, Filmy, among others.
Roy was named the tenth most influential Indian businessman in 2012 by India Today. In 2004, the Sahara group was termed by Time magazine as “the second largest employer in India after Indian Railways”. Sahara operates through more than 5,000 establishments across India and has a workforce of around 1.2 million (field and office) under the Sahara India umbrella.
Early life
| Name | Subrata Roy |
| Net Worth | $1 billion |
| Occupation | Businessman |
| Age | 75 years |
| Height | 1.75m |
Subrata Roy was born on June 10, 1948, until his death on November 14, 2023, at age 75. He was raised in a Bengali Hindu family in Araria to Sudhir Chandra Roy and Chhabi Roy. His father and mother came from Dhaka, Bikrampur, East Bengal (now Bangladesh) from a rich landlord family named Bhagyakul Zamindar. He studied at Holy Child Institute in Kolkata and later studied mechanical engineering at Government Technical Institute, Gorakhpur. He started his first business in Gorakhpur.
Business career
Subrata Roy joined Sahara Finance, a struggling company, in 1976, that ran a chit fund and took it over. He changed its financial model in 1978. Sahara is said to have used the financial model of the much older Peerless Group. They are termed residuary non-banking companies (RNBCs) that accept deposits of very low amounts.
Roy moved to Lucknow in the 1990s which became the base of his group. From there, it went on to become the largest conglomerate of India with a diversified range of business interests. The company now has interests in financial services, education, real estate, media, entertainment, tourism, healthcare, and hospitality.
The Hindi language newspaper Rashtriya Sahara was started in 1992. In the late 1990s, the ambitious Aamby Valley City project near Pune was initiated. In 2000, Sahara TV was launched which was later renamed Sahara One. In 2003, Sahara started three weeklies: Sahara Time (English), Sahara Samay (Hindi) and Sahara Aalmi (Urdu).
In 2010, Sahara purchased the iconic Grosvenor House Hotel in London, and in 2012 the historic Plaza Hotel and Dream Downtown Hotel in New York City. Sahara has a workforce of around 1.2 million including salaried employees, consultants, field workers, agents, business associates, etc. In 2004, Sahara Group was termed by Time magazine as “the second-largest employer in India” after the Government-run Indian Railways. Sahara is said to have 9 crore plus investors and depositors, representing about 13% of all households in India.
Roy was planning to foray into online education (Edunguru) in India, which was targeted at small towns and villages. He put a team in place which consists of members from top universities and colleges across India, and even abroad. The route map of the program was prepared, and 14,000 hours of lectures were developed for this. In June 2019, Roy announced his foray into the automobile sector under the brand name ‘Sahara Evols’. The Sahara Evols venture will offer a wide range of electric vehicles (EVs) along with advanced allied services.
On 26 February 2014, the Supreme Court of India ordered the detention of Subrata Roy for failing to appear before it in connection with a legal dispute with Market Regulator – SEBI. In a statement after the arrest, his lawyer said Roy’s 92-year-old mother was in poor health and needed “her eldest son” by her side, and hence he failed to appear at the court. As he failed to appear in the court during the ongoing legal battle, Roy was held in custody in the Tihar Jail, Delhi and was out on parole since May 2016. Sahara was allowed to sell a part of its assets in India to raise part of the money in question.
Roy rejected allegations of misconduct and accused the Indian National Congress of a witch hunt due to his opposition to Sonia Gandhi becoming the country’s prime minister. Initially, he was granted interim bail by the Supreme Court on 26 March 2014 on condition of depositing ₹10,000 crore to the market regulator SEBI. His deposit of ₹10,000 crore was not made. As of August 2014, Roy was trying to sell some of his hotel properties to raise enough money.
Roy was granted his first bail in May 2017 for four weeks to perform the last rites for his deceased mother, later extended to 24 October. Since then he has been successful in getting his bail extended on various grounds. As of 31 January 2019, Sahara still had to pay ₹10,621 crore to meet its total liability. He claimed that the company’s fundamentals are intact and assets are greater (3 to 5 times) than the liabilities. Sahara also has deposited ₹22,500 crores which will in due course of justice come back to Sahara India as it has already repaid 95% of its investors.
The Securities And Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has repaid only ₹64 crore to investors since 2012. It has also been reported that Sahara has paid ₹725.97 crore as TDS (tax deducted at source) to the Income Tax Departments on the interest which along with investment was repaid to 95 percent of the investors, between 2009–2010 and 2012–2013. The income tax authorities had found that the beneficiary investors have existed and accordingly confirmed the repayments made in those particular years. One of Sahara’s arguments in the apex court revolves around the fact that if one government body has found investors, why the other cannot do so.
On 28 August 2020, two petitions were filed against the release of the Netflix documentary Bad Boy Billionaires: India in the Bihar District Court. The Bihar Court passed an interim stay order on the petition filed by Roy against the release of the documentary on the Netflix platform. Following the stay order by the Bihar court, Netflix threatened to move the Supreme Court against the court order to restrain the documentary release.
On 5 October 2020, Netflix released three out of four films in the anthology, including those featuring Vijay Mallya (“The King of Good Times”), Nirav Modi (“Diamonds Aren’t Forever”) and Subrata Roy (“The World’s Biggest Family”), while the final episode about Ramalinga Raju remained encumbered by legal injunctions and as of December 2020 has yet to be released.
In 2013, Sahara contributed to the relief efforts in flood-hit Uttarakhand region wherein one lakh bottles of drinking water, packaged juice and food packets along with candles and matchboxes were said to be provided by them. There were 25 medical health unit vans equipped with doctors and free medicines made available and it was said by the group that, they would contribute to the rehabilitation programme by constructing 10,000 pre-fabricated houses.
After the Kargil War, Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee praised Sahara India for providing financial support to the 127 families of martyrs. Hotel Sahara Star in Mumbai partnered with Feeding India in 2021. As a part of its CSR initiatives, the hotel provides food to hungry people.
Subrata Roy received an honorary doctorate in business leadership from the University of East London in 2013, a Business Icon of the Year award at the Powerbrands Hall of Fame Awards in London in 2011 and was the ITA – TV Icon of the Year in 2007. He received the Global Leadership Award in 2004.
Roy received Businessmen of the Year Award in 2002, the Best Industrialist Award in 2002, Vishisht Rashtriya Udaan Samman (2010) by a daily from one of India’s top publication houses, Vocational Award for Excellence (2010) by Rotary International, Karmaveer Samman (1995), Udyam Shree (1994), Baba-E-Rozgar Award (1992) and the National Citizen Award in 2001.
He was awarded a general jury award by the Indian Television Academy Awards and an honorary degree of D. Litt. by Lalit Narayan Mithila University, Darbhanga. Roy featured regularly in the India Today list of 50 Most Powerful People of India since 2003 and was named its tenth-most influential businessman in 2012.
Subrata Roy Cause of death
Subrata Roy died due to cardiorespiratory arrest following an extended battle with complications arising from metastatic malignancy, hypertension and diabetes on 14 November 2023, at the age of 75. Subrata Roy was admitted to Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital & Medical Research Institute in Mumbai on Sunday following a decline in health.
Wife
Subrata Roy was married to his wife Swapna Roy until his death. The couple had two children, Sushanto Roy and Seemanto Roy.
Subrata Roy net worth
How much was Subrata Roy worth? Subrata Roy net worth was estimated at around $1 billion. His main source of income was from his primary work as a businessman. Subrata Roy’s salary per month and other career earnings were over $4 million dollars annually. His remarkable career achievements earned him some luxurious lifestyles and some fancy car trips. He was one of the richest and most influential politicians in India. He stood at an appealing height of 1.75m and had a good body weight which suited his personality.