Brand, Baaja, Bharat

WEDDINGS EDIFY THE power of commitment. That might be stating the obvious but not if you are an Ambani. The Anant Ambani- Radhika Merchant pre-wedding celebrations will invariably be commented upon for their lavishness, but in reality they take commitment to an unprecedented level.

Take the guest list. Apart from India’s Who’s Who, there were Bill Gates, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, BlackRock co-founder Larry Fink, Bhutan’s king and queen, Qatar’s prime minister, Disney’s Bob Iger, as well as Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner.

Why, some may ask, are these global super brands so ‘committed’ to obliging Asia’s richest man? Why would they feel compelled to attend what is, after all, a pre-wedding bash? The wedding, as is well known, is scheduled for July later this year.

The most obvious explanation is friendship. No one can deny that the Ambanis are amiable to a fault and over the years, as their business worth has vaulted, so has their social stock. In rarefied social circles the word is out that an Ambani party invite is to die for. Indeed, curated Ambani parties excel at evoking a sort of magical, belle époque of a Louise XIV Versailles ball. Except, the Ambani palatial parlours mirror the resplendence of India’s aesthetics.

Fittingly, the Anant and Radhika gala has taken place in a 3,000-acre garden on the Ambani home estate in Jamnagar. Only that their ‘Eden’ is laden with the treacly essence of the famously fecund mango orchards— a fitting tribute to the couple’s storied love lore. Rihanna, dressed in a gossamer Arabian Nights fantasy costume, has given the party the frisson of Eastern sensuality. American David Blaine was on hand to create the ‘illusion’ of mind-altering headiness. According to reports, guests were given directions to don ‘jungle fever’ outfits for a glitzy cocktail party. To keep it all a little real, there were visits to the Ambanis’ animal rescue centre. But only until 65 chefs made 2,500 palate-tantalising dishes.

But to ensure the presence of more than one social lodestar takes more than just famed Ambani amiability and the allure of Indian cultural soft power.

The answer to this lies beyond the ho-hum, and one would daresay, a spot of pop psychology. So let’s turn to a harder reality.

Sometime ago, Mukesh Ambani did what Jamsetji Tata once came close to doing. He succeeded in catapulting the India story to a global platform in an extraordinary strategic shift.

This pivot coincided with India’s own economic and financial reorientation. In a series of calibrated steps, India veered away from the licence raj that had snuffed out entrepreneurial nous to embrace economic liberalism.

A little over 20 years after Mukesh Ambani took over the chairman-ship of RIL, his tenure is marked by, as Money Control put it, “an unwavering attention year-on-year on creating more and more wealth not just for shareholders but for India, too, in the highest traditions of stakeholder capitalism.” The coming Indian economic hegemony is but a sum-part of the can-do spirit of industrialists like Mukesh Ambani.

The global icons at the latest Ambani social event were there also to prove their commitment to the burgeoning India story. Who would surrender an opportunity to catch the Indian consumer’s mind’s eye that no amount of marketing could buy?

It’s the India coming-of-age party that, over-the-top or not, no one wants to miss.

About The Author

Rahul Shivshankar

Rahul Shivshankar is Consulting Editor, Network 18

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