Subhash Runwal: Newest billionaire of India, built a whole property empire from ground zero

Mr. Subhash Runwal – Chairman Runwal group

Subhash Runwal, who is one of the India’s newest billionaire, makes his debut this year with a worth of $1 billion fortune, hails from Dhulia, which is a small town in Maharashtra state. His grandfather was a jeweler but when Mr. Runwal was a teenager, the family had faced a very hard times. This young boy lad the group of five siblings and left the town Dhulia to study commerce in Pune city, after completing graduating in commerce to do his chartered accountancy he moved to Mumbai and on that time he was having less than $2 in his pocket at age 21.

Professional career:

After completing chartered accountancy he joined Ernst & Ernst as first job where he got an American posting in St Louis, Missouri, but after six to eight months he decided to pack up and return home because of different lifestyle, says Runwal, seated in his suburban office in Mumbai. Behind his desk is a painting, the handiwork of his daughter, which he proudly displays. His first abode as a young lad was a modest studio in a far-off suburb in Mumbai that he rented after landing a job at a chemical firm as an accountant. I can do it attitude helped him a lot to acquire a reputation as the go-to guy for dealing with hidebound bureaucracy. As he was able to speak local Marathi language fluently, so he was able to strike a rapport with local bureaucrats and politicians as well and they was giving all impossible tasks to him, recalls Runwal.

On that time one of his major tasks was to lobbying the central government to ban the import of a chemical, which was manufacturing by his company. Still he can recall that this task took 52 trips to Delhi over a year for Runwal to secure the crucial ban that enabled the company to start reaping profits. In this process Runwal had built up his network in bureaucratic circles and then he he decided to put everything at risk, choosing real estate as his field of play.

Entry in real estate market:

Runwal had chanced upon an opportunity hidden in a draconian law called the Urban Land (Ceiling & Regulation) Act of 1976, which he had studied in detail an under this particular law the government imposed limits on land ownership and had the power to acquire vacant urban land as this law has been repealed in most parts. Than Runwal acquired his first ever plot of 22 acres in a central suburb of Mumbai, which is an area that was eventually to become his stronghold in the property market. After making his first property deal and never looked back as his specialty was to buy litigious plots or lands that had fallen into the ambit of the land ceiling law and then he work on his way into getting the titles cleared. Due to putting his name on those projects, he becomes famous for providing low cost apartments aimed at the middle class. His one of the notable project called Runwal Nagar in the suburb of Thane was a cluster of 16 buildings however; after 18 months of the initial sale, the price had more than doubled. The more he added that, our customers were people who had never owned their own homes before and most of them were from middle class. They would come to my office with boxes of Indian sweets and touch my feet.

Milestone of success:

Now Runwal was building his own real estate empire and he harbored the dream of becoming an industrialist so he got into manufacturing arm as well. Later he expanded into steel and pharma but those businesses unraveled. Than eventually he sold out and renewed his focus on real estate while his Runwal Group was still busy in building the low cost affordable middle class housing and it has moved up several notches and now has projects in tony south Mumbai where it is building luxury residences for the uber rich.

Entry of new generation in business:

Later in 1995, the entry of his two B-school trained sons in his privately-held family business make him to enter into malls business. The more he added that sons pushed me to market their projects more aggressively and create a new corporate identity for Runwal as his older son Sandeep is an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore and the younger son, Subodh, is an MBA from Northeastern University. Runwal has managed to get the backing of the Singapore government’s GIC, which invested in one of its malls in Mumbai, the more he added that completing projects on time is critical in his business, but his none of the projects never get stuck for approvals as nothing was impossible for him due to high connection with bureaucrats and politicians. Lately, Runwal has been picking up big plots in suburban Mumbai, which ensures a long pipeline of new projects.

After certain time he put all his efforts to giving back to society as he donates $1.5 million every year to various causes. He built two hostels in Navi Mumbai and now he offers education scholarships to the less well off. Now every morning he walks on the promenade opposite his sea-front home and counts Bollywood actor Shahrukh Khan as his neighbor and the more he added that “I’ve achieved more than I could have ever dream of.”