The Ambani saga has been fairly Bollywood-esque: Dhirubhai the patriarch with the unerring business sense who built a mighty empire. The two sons – Mukesh and Anil feuding upon the passing of the patriarch and the mother intervening to broker a tenuous peace. The recent bailout of Anil by brother Mukesh seems to be yet another chapter in this saga.
Not too long ago, Anil Ambani had sued brother Mukesh for defamation and accused his company of “plain and simple corporate greed”. Anil Ambani is singing a very different tune now, when the brother stepped up to help him repay a large Rs 550 crore amount owed by his RCom to Ericsson.
Perhaps it didn’t pan out quite like Hero No 1 but it was pretty darned similar. Anil apparently said he was “touched with this gesture” of his brother, and declared himself to be “grateful we have moved beyond the past” in a formal statement.
Some on Twitter thought that this was a display of good solid Indian family values: one brother bailing out the other in times of trouble.
Some commentators thought the bailout was not such a big deal; given Mukesh Ambani’s net worth as the richest Indian and one of the richest people in the world.
It was brotherly love that saved the day, felt a lot of the tweeple.
…Time Bhai aayega, says this tweet.
Translated this means, some relationships are like a debt, rather than maintain them, you but have to repay them.
Perhaps the conversation went something like this and Mukesh said something like “I’ll do the needful, don’t worry”.
There is another business tycoon – Vijay Mallya – who is in a lot of financial trouble, the tweeple reminded us.
According to one view, this was not so much generosity of spirit as Mukesh paying a small amount to protect the Reliance brand; rather the Ambani Family brand.
It seemed to be a pattern, where the same type of tweet accompanying the same photo was tweeted by hundreds of different users, which led some people to conclude that the news was deliberately publicised/trended.
Recently a few publications reported that Azim Premji, chairperson of Wipro pledged 34% shares of his company worth $7.5 billion or Rs. 52,750 crores to charity. ‘Donating’ one hundredth that sum to a family member seems a lot less newsworthy; felt a lot of people; some of whom also raised the possibility of a political motive behind the trend.
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