Meet Anil Agarwal, the man behind Vedanta’s mega ambitious demerger

Anil Agarwal

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26 Aug, 2025 12:21

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Vedanta announced on September 29 the demerger of its business into six listed entities for significant value unlocking. The six companies include Vedanta Limited, Vedanta Steel and Ferrous Materials, and Vedanta Base Metals. The company’s chairman Anil Agarwal, the man behind the ambitious demerger, said: “By demerging our business units, we believe that will unlock value and potential for faster growth in each vertical.”

Agarwal, who is counted among India’s richest, had a humble beginning. His grit and mettle might have taken him places now, but the meek Patna boy who could only speak two words in English – “yes” and “no” -- had started out as a scrap dealer in the 1970s.

The founder and chairman of the Vedanta Group was born in 1954 to a Marwari family in Bihar. Instead of going to college, he began his career at a young age by joining his father’s small aluminium conductor business.

At the age of 19, he had set out for the city of dreams -- Mumbai – where he began collecting scrap metal from cable companies and selling them. This earned him a good profit over time and he acquired his first company in 1976 by using all his savings and seeking help from friends and family.

Copper manufacturer Shamsher Sterling Corporation, the company he acquired, was at the brink of bankruptcy at the time.  For the next 10 years, the mining whiz ran both businesses side by side before setting up a factory – Sterlite Industries -- in 1986. Soon, he realised he would have to contain the input cost and decided to start manufacturing the requisite metals himself instead of purchasing them. In 1993, Sterlite Industries became the first Indian private sector company to smelt copper.

Over the next few years, he acquired several other companies such as Madras Aluminium, Bharat Aluminium Company (51 percent stakes), and state-run Hindustan Zinc Limited (HZL). It is these acquisitions that set Agarwal on the path to become a metal and mining magnate.

In 2003, Anil Agarwal set up Vedanta Resources in London to tap in global capital. However, Vedanta had to deal with a string of bad luck with environment activists opposing his mining excavations. To add to it, the Centre had revoked Vedanta’s clearance to mine bauxite in 2010. His oil and gas business had suffered too, with the UPA government at the Centre denying him permission to expand Vedanta’s oil field in Rajasthan. During the same time, there was a slump in the international commodities market, prompting Agarwal to pull out of LSE in 2018 and making the company private.

Over the next few years, Agarwal’s Vedanta acquired several mines across the globe and also made a foray into the semiconductor business.

However, Anil Agarwal’s illustrious life does not stop at his achievements. A philanthrope, the Executive Chairman of Vedanta Resources Plc and the Chairman Emeritus of Vedanta Limited has reportedly vowed to donate most of his wealth to charity. That apart, he has made several donations over the years for the advancement of healthcare and education and also established the Vedanta Foundation.