Behind every billionaire there is a story!

Excited Agarwal looks set to prove his mettle

India is always quick to celebrate the emergence of a national corporate champion - even if that person left the country years ago to make his fortune.

Lakshmi Mittal, the London-based Indian entrepreneur, became an instant celebrity when he took control of Luxembourg’s Arcelor to create the world’s largest steel producer, ArcelorMittal, in 2006.

Now Anil Agarwal, the London-based executive chairman of UK-listed Vedanta Resources, is emerging as Mr Mittal’s Indian counterpart in non-ferrous metals, such as aluminium, zinc and copper.

Mr Agarwal was feted in Mumbai’s press last month when a Vedanta subsidiary, Sterlite Industries, launched India’s biggest takeover of a US company, the $2.6bn (£1.32bn) acquisition of the assets of Asarco, a bankrupt copper producer.

The 54-year-old Mr Agarwal, whose personal fortune is estimated by Forbes at $6bn, is affable in person. “We are very excited,” Mr Agarwal says of the acquisition in an interview with the FT. “This kind of company in today’s times is difficult to get.”

But the billionaire, who left school at 15 and started out as a scrap metal trader in Mumbai, is not as easygoing in business.

No stranger to confrontation with government and environmentalists, he runs a group with sales of $8.2bn for the year to March, up 26 per cent from a year earlier

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http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7596853e-3689-11dd-8bb8-0000779fd2ac.html