The techniques exported by warrior businessmen extended not only to land use. It turned out that the political skills they had acquired at home, where they bought up sections of the political establishment as an extension of their business infrastructure, served them extremely well in the new battlegrounds of Africa. Far from being a primitive, dying breed, India’s ‘robber barons’ saw a bright future for themselves in the twenty-first century. In Africa, central Asia and the other key territories of contemporary resource battles, they had a great number of competitive advantages over, say, American corporations. They possessed large amounts of unmonitored capital which could be turned into cash for bribes or unofficial purchases. They knew far better than American CEOs how to navigate the political corridors of post-colonial countries. And they had a warlike sense of mission that almost nothing could contain.
It is no surprise, therefore, that one began to see, in several countries outside India, new and aggressive Indian elites who were feared by local populations and often treated as new imperialists. An example would be that of the Gupta brothers, who left Mickey Chopra’s home state of Uttar Pradesh in 1994 to explore business opportunities in South Africa. Their father was a small-town businessman who sent his sons to high school under armed guard; he set up a trading company in Delhi which the three sons went on to run in the 1980s, gaining their business spurs in the Indian capital in the years either side of liberalisation. During that time, they heard it was possible for Indians who had lived under South African apartheid to receive, like blacks, special business privileges. Having never lived under South African apartheid, they were not eligible for ‘Black Economic Empowerment’ status, but they managed to secure it all the same. As one newspaper commented, speaking of the commercial advantages won in this way by aggressive businesspeople like the Guptas, “Critics of black economic empowerment legislation say it has increasingly served a small elite, creating Russian-style oligarchs who enjoy vast wealth while doing little to serve the plight of the millions of poor.”53
The brothers’ father sent money from Delhi to fund the early development of their business and, on their arrival, they:
… rapidly made contact with rising stars of the new black elite. Today, the Guptas are known for their billionaire lifestyles and open-door access to the highest levels of government, including the president Jacob Zuma. Living in a 52 million rand [$6.5 million] mansion in Saxonwold, a Johannesburg suburb lined with century-old oak trees [and a $3-million house in Johannesburg, formerly the home of Mark Thatcher] the brothers are alleged to have used close political links for participation in contracts legislation had set aside for blacks…
It is unclear just how the brothers made all their wealth, although they do own one of the largest distributors of personal computers in South Africa. What is known is that the Guptas, together with the president’s son, Duduzane Zuma, 28, have become increasingly linked to deals that have been lucrative in the extreme.
The three are part of a consortium that will give them a stake in the global steel giant ArcelorMittal worth more than 3 billion rands [$4 million]. The brothers have been linked to plans to build a 350-billion-rand [$45 billion] high-speed railway system using state and Chinese funding.
They are also said to have become involved in the 9.7 billion rand purchase of the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town, the country’s most valuable piece of property, from a consortium that included Dubai World. The Waterfront was sold to a local group that included a state-owned pension fund. Somehow, the Guptas and Duduzane Zuma were able to come on board as black partners, a legal requirement in any deal involving a state entity. The three have denied any impropriety in their deals…
It has not helped that the Guptas’ lifestyle is so at odds with how most South Africans live. An application for a helicopter landing pad at their compound drew wide media coverage last year. Their launching of a daily newspaper, viewed as a counter to the continuing negative publicity they and their ruling party connections have received, has also not helped.
Now it appears that some in the ruling African National Congress (ANC) have had enough. Allegations that the Guptas have grown so powerful they can summon cabinet ministers to their compound and authorise the appointment of senior officials at state-owned enterprises appear to be the last straw for some. The party’s powerful youth league said this week the brothers were “colonising this country”. The country’s trade union federation, Cosatu, which is part of the ANC’s governing alliance, has also said it will launch an investigation into alleged “plundering” of the economy by the Guptas.54
The Gupta empire, which they controlled directly and through a series of family-owned investment companies, may have begun with computers, but it quickly moved into other sectors, especially those sectors most controlled and regulated by politics: uranium and coal mining, media, aviation, etc. The business was plagued by scandal but it managed to maintain its position through a business network that included not only South African businessmen and politicians but other members of the global Indian business elite, such as the steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal (who himself had to face allegations of improper political influence, this time within the UK government of Tony Blair; a year after the Mittal ‘cash-for-influence’ scandal, the Blair administration had to answer another set questions about the nature of its relationship to the billionaire Hinduja brothers, who appeared to have the power to fast-track their own UK citizenship applications). The dismay caused by public revelations that the Gupta family in summer 2013 made use of a high-security military base, not only to land a jet bringing guests to their family wedding, but also to absolve them of immigration requirements, showed just how much concern there was about the levels of control enjoyed by the family over systems and installations of the state.
While the Gupta family’s fortune certainly derived from its interests in Africa, its style — the pious rhetoric of vegetarianism and the extended family, the public extolling of the brothers’ saintly father and simple mother, the friendships with Indian film stars and the personal and financial investment in cricket — all came from its north Indian roots. As did the name of their original company, Sahara Holdings, named for Saharanpur in Uttar Pradesh, but which in the African context took on a different meaning. The brothers liked to joke that they turned things into a desert for their competition.55
• • •
More than a year after my first meeting with Mickey, I meet him for another drink. He and a friend are booked for a massage at a five-star hotel; he arranges to meet me there beforehand.
He seems to have put on perfume just before getting out of the car; it overpowers me as we shake hands. He’s thirty now, and he looks more polished than I remember. His suit is beautiful. He carries nothing except an iPad and an iPhone.
His friend sits down with him and absorbs himself in some activity on a big touch screen. Mickey orders a bottle of Krug. The waiter treats him in the way I suppose he is treated in every five-star hotel of the city.