Often referred as India's Warren Buffett, Rakesh Jhunjhunwala died on Sunday, prompting an outpouring of tributes for a self-made billionaire whose fortunes rose with the country's economy.
Jhunjhunwala died at the age of 62, a week after the launch of his budget airline, Akasa Air. He had looked and sounded frail promoting the carrier. The cause of his death was not immediately known.
He is survived by his wife, whom he used to call his only client, and three children. He leaves stakes in around three dozen Indian companies and a legacy of quoting one-liners like "the trend is your friend" and "the only rule I have is there are no rules".
"All I've known is trading and investing. I don’t want to do anything else in life," Jhunjhunwala told Reuters 10 years ago. "I'll call it quits the day I die."
Born in the state of Rajasthan and trained in chartered accountancy, Jhunjhunwala started dabbling in stocks as a teenager and went on to manage a stock trading firm, RARE Enterprises. His net worth was about $6 billion, according to Forbes.
He made his first big profit by buying 5,000 shares in Tata Tea with borrowed money, confident the markets had under-estimated the potential of a company looking to grow at a time of rising yield production. He trebled his money within months.
(With inputs from agencies)
