Gopichand Hinduja: Architect of a global empire
He helped turn a modest family trading firm into one of the world’s richest conglomerates
Last Updated: Nov 04, 2025, 18:44 IST3 min
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Gopichand Parmanand Hinduja—GP to friends and business associates—passed away in London on November 4, 2025, marking the end of an era for one of the world’s most quietly influential business dynasties. He was 85.
For decades, the Hinduja name had been synonymous with global ambition, albeit from a family with its roots in the Indian subcontinent. Yet, behind the formality of conglomerate press releases and the polished smiles of family portraits, GP was the understated engine—calm, methodical, and intensely private—who helped transform a modest trading outfit into a multinational empire. He rarely met outsiders.
Born in 1940 into a Sindhi business family in the bustling pre-Independence India, Gopichand grew up in Licence Raj India where frugality was prized and hard work praised, but being seen as wealthy frowned upon. His father, Parmanand Deepchand Hinduja, had already established a trading business in Iran, dealing in goods from textiles to spices. The young GP went to Mumbai’s Jai Hind College, joined the family business in the late 1950s and quickly earned a reputation for his meticulous style. He is believed to have read every line of a contract twice before signing.
By the 1970s, as India’s business climate remained constrained by regulation, the family looked outward. GP, along with his elder brother Srichand, shifted base to London and began steering the Hinduja Group toward global expansion. They steered their now global empire from a mansion near Buckingham Palace, running a company that would soon stretch from Europe to Asia to the Middle East.
While the older Srichand, who passed away in 2023, was the public face, it was Gopichand who shaped strategy. “SP would dream, GP would execute,” a long-time associate once said. Together, the brothers made the Hinduja Group a symbol of Indian globalism—long before another compatriot, Lakshmi Mittal, would also relocate to London and build a global steel empire.
Building the Hinduja empire
Under Gopichand Hinduja’s steady hand, the Hinduja Group diversified far beyond its trading roots. The turning point came in the 1980s when the family acquired Gulf Oil International and Ashok Leyland, two deals that announced their arrival as serious industrialists. The acquisitions were bold and, for the time, nearly audacious—as Indian-origin businessmen buying global assets at this scale was unheard of.
Over the next three decades, the Hinduja Group grew into a conglomerate spanning automotive manufacturing, energy, banking, media, health care, infrastructure, and hospitality as per its website. Its operations stretched across 30 countries and employed more than 200,000 people. The group’s headquarters—set in an elegant historic building overlooking St James’s Park in London—became a symbol of Indian wealth at the heart of Britain. The brothers were regularly featured on lists of the UKs most wealthy.
GP’s management philosophy was simple but effective: Build long-term businesses, maintain tight family control, and never court unnecessary publicity. Yet, despite his aversion to the spotlight, the numbers spoke loudly. By the 2010s, the Hindujas had become fixtures at the top of the Sunday Times Rich List, with an estimated net worth exceeding £35 billion. Their ventures in India, from Ashok Leyland’s revival to IndusInd Bank’s success, showcased their turnaround abilities. Although a cyclical business, Leyland has held its own against rival Tata Motors, and IndusInd, its recent troubles notwithstanding, is seen as a serious contender for the top hustings in Indian banking.
Controversies and family fractures
But the story of Gopichand Hinduja, like that of many dynasties, had its fair share of turbulence. In 2001, GP found himself entangled in Britain’s “cash-for-passports” controversy. No charges were brought.
An internal family dispute was arguably more damaging. For decades, the four Hinduja brothers—Srichand, Gopichand, Prakash, and Ashok—operated on a principle that “everything belongs to everyone and nothing belongs to anyone”. That understanding fractured dramatically when a 2014 letter asserting shared ownership of family assets became the subject of bitter litigation in a London court.
And then came the European legal troubles. In 2024, members of the family’s Swiss branch were convicted of exploiting domestic staff. GP himself was not personally implicated. Through all of this, he maintained his characteristic reserve. He was known to friends as a man who rarely raised his voice, even in crisis.
With the passing away of GP, the two surviving members of his generation Ashok and Prakash Hinduja are likely to take over operations, while operating companies continue to be managed by professional boards. But in his death the group loses a respected patriarch and his wise counsel.
First Published: Nov 04, 2025, 19:00
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