born: 

June 15, 1950

Achievement: World's largest steel maker and the third richest man in the world. 

Lakshmi Mittal has become something of a cult figure in the global steel industry. His company Mittal Steel is the
largest steel maker in the world. After the recent merger between Mittal Steel and Arcelor which raged a big debate
throughout the Europe, Laxmi Mittal current controls 10% of the total steel production and the combined entity that
has come into force post-merger is three times the size of its nearest competitors. 

Lakshmi Niwas Mittal was born on June 15, 1950 at Sadulpur, in Churu district of Rajasthan, in a poor family. The
extended family of 20 lived on bare concrete floors, slept on rope beds and cooked on an open fire in the brickyard in
a house built by his grandfather. Laxmi Mittal belongs to Marwari Aggarwal caste and his grandfather worked for the
Tarachand Ghanshyam Das firm, one of the leading Marwari industrial firms of pre-independence India. 

The family later on moved to Kolkata where his father Mohan Mittal became a partner in a steel company. Lakshmi
Mittal graduated from St. Xaviers in Kolkata with a commerce degree in 1969. He began his career working in the
family's steelmaking business in India and in 1976, Lakshmi Mittal founded Mittal Steel Company. He split from his
father and two younger brothers in 1994 and took the international arm, with interests in Indonesia and Trinidad and
Tobago, while the rest of the family kept the domestic Indian business. In the last few years Mittal Steel has made a
number of acquisitions, buying up a network of steel producers in former communist countries including Kazakhstan,
Romania and Ukraine, and pushing into the U.S. in 2004 with the $4.5 billion purchase of International Steel Group.
Today, Mittal Steel is the only truly global steel producer in the world with operations on 14 countries, spanning 4
continents.

Lakshmi Mittal is also known for his opulence. In 2003, he acquired the Kensington mansion, said to be the world's
most expensive home, from Formula One racing's Bernie Ecclestone for £70 million ($128 million). His daughter
Vanisha's $50 million wedding bash is touted as the most expensive wedding of the 20th century. 

In March 2006, Lakshmi Mittal was listed as the third wealthiest person in the world after Bill Gates and Warren Buffet
by Forbes Magazine.

Lakshmi Mittal
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lakshmi Mittal

Born 15 June 1950 (age 60)

Sadulpur, Rajasthan, India

Residence London, United Kingdom

Ethnicity Indian

Citizenship India

Alma mater St. Xavier's College, Calcutta[1]

Occupation Chairman & CEO of ArcelorMittal

Owner of Karrick Limited[2]

Net worth US$28.7 billion (2010)[3]

Religion Hinduism

Children Vanisha Mittal

Aditya Mittal
Lakshmi Narayan Mittal (Rajasthani: लक्ष्मी मित्तल; born 15 June 1950)[4] is an Indian steel magnate. He is

the chairman and chief executive officer of ArcelorMittal.

Mittal is the richest man in Europe and is presently the fifth richest in the world with a personal wealth
of US$28.7 billion or £19.3 billion.[3]He is the 44th most powerful person of the 68 most powerful people in the
world. One out of 5 cars in the world is made up of the steel materials of his steel empire. His daughter Vanisha
Mittal's marriage was the most expensive in the recorded history of the world.[5][6]

He serves as a non-executive director of Goldman Sachs, EADS and ICICI Bank[7] He is a member of the

Board of Directors of European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company[8], Foreign Investment Council in
Kazakhstan, the International Investment Council in South Africa, the Investors' Council to the Cabinet of
Ministers of Ukraine, the World Economic Forum’s International Business Council, the World Steel
Association's Executive Committee, the Presidential International Advisory Board of Mozambique and the
International Iron and Steel Institute’s Executive Committee.[9] He is presently the vice chairman of the World
Steel Association, a board council member of the Prime Minister of India's Global Advisory Council of Overseas
Indians.[10] and a member in the Advisory Board of the Kellogg School of Management, Executive Board
at Indian School of Business and St. Xavier's College, Calcutta Alumni Association, London Chapter.

In 2006, Financial Times named him "Person of the Year". In 2007, Time magazine included him in their "100
most influential persons in the world".

Contents
 [hide]

1 Early life

2 London 2012 Olympics and Paralympic Games

3 Philanthropy

4 Criticism and allegations

o 4.1 PHS

o 4.2 Slave-labour allegations and abhorrent

safety records

o 4.3 The Mittal Affair: "Cash for Influence"

o 4.4 Queens Park Rangers

o 4.5 Environmental damage

5 Personal life

6 Awards and Honours

7 Bibliography
 8 See also

9 References

10 External links

[edit]Early life

Lakshmi Mittal was born into a Marwari business family in Churu district of Rajasthan, India. His family moved
from His family moved from Sadulpur, Rajasthan to Calcutta in West Bengal. He graduated from St. Xavier's
College, Calcutta where he graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce degree in business and accounting with
first class. He has two siblings (brothers) named Pramod Mittal and Vinod Mittal. His father, Mohan Lal Mittal,
ran a steel business, Nippon Denro Ispat. Until the 1990s, the family's main assets in India were a cold-rolling
mill for sheet steels in Nagpur and an alloy steels plant near Pune. Today, the family business, including a
large integrated steel plant near Mumbai, is run by Lakshmi's brothers, Pramod and Vinod, but Lakshmi has no
connection with it.[11]

Mittal started his career working in the family's steel making business in India, and in 1976, when the family
founded its own steel business, he set out to establish its international division, beginning with the buying of a
run-down plant in Indonesia. Shortly afterwards he married Usha, the daughter of a well-to-do moneylender. In
1976, due to differences with his father, mother and brothers,branched out on his the LNM Group, and he has
been responsible for the development of its businesses ever since. Mittal Steel is a global steel producer with
operations in 14 countries.

Mittal pioneered the development of integrated mini-mills and the use of direct reduced iron or "DRI" as a scrap
substitute for steelmaking and led the consolidation process of the global steel industry. Mittal Steel is the
largest steelmaker in the world, with shipments of 42.1 million tons of steel and profits of over $22 billion in
2004.

Mittal was awarded Fortune magazine's "European Businessman of the Year 2004" and also "Steelmaker of
the Year" in 1996 by New Steel, and the "Willy Korf Steel Vision Award" in 1998, for outstanding vision,
entrepreneurship, leadership and success in global steel development from Metal Market and PaineWeber’s
World Steel Dynamics. In 2002, he was involved in a political scandal with British Prime Minister Tony Blair,
when a donation he made to the Labour party led to Blair's intervention in a business deal favoring Mittal. It
was announced later that he donated £2 million to the Labour Party.Also conducting charitable activity at his
home town.

[edit]London 2012 Olympics and Paralympic Games

ArcelorMittal, led by Chairman and CEO Lakshmi Mittal, will fund £16 million of the £19.1 million project, with
the outstanding £3.1 million provided by the London Development Agency. As such, the sculpture not only
represents a significant cultural investment - the largest single artwork ever commissioned for any Olympiad -
but will also make a significant financial contribution to the long-term regeneration of East London.[12]

The ArcelorMittal Orbit, the largest artistic commission in the world, will harness state-of-the-art engineering
and architectural techniques. Constructed with steel provided by ArcelorMittal, the sculpture will consist of a
continuous looping lattice of tubular steel and offer unparalleled view of the entire Olympic Park and London's
skyline from a special viewing platform.[12]

[edit]Philanthropy

After witnessing India win only one medal, bronze, in the 2000 Summer Olympics, and one medal, silver, at
the 2004 Summer Olympics, Mittal decided to set up Mittal Champions Trustwith US$9 million to support 10
Indian athletes with world-beating potential.[13] In 2008, Mittal awarded Abhinav Bindra with Rs. 1.5 Crore (Rs.
15 million), for getting India its first individual Olympic gold medal in shooting.

For Comic Relief 2007, he matched the money raised (~£1 million) on the celebrity special BBC
programme, The Apprentice.

ArcelorMittal also has a very active CSR program under which it sets out its path to produce Safe Sustainable
Steel. The company also operates the ArcelorMittal Foundation, which provides support to many different
community projects around the world in the countries where ArcelorMittal operates.

His institute "The Lakshmi Niwas Mittal Institute of Information Technology, Jaipur" is producing quality
engineers since 2003.

[edit]Criticism and allegations

[edit]PHS

Lakshmi Mittal successfully employed Marek Dochnal's consultancy to influence Polish officials in the
privatization of PHS steel group, which was Poland's largest. Dochnal was later arrested for bribing Polish
officials on behalf of Russian agents in a separate affair.[14]

In 2007, Polish government said it wants to renegotiate the 2004 sale to Arcelor Mittal.[15]

[edit]Slave-labour allegations and abhorrent safety records

Employees of Mittal have accused him of "slave labour" conditions after multiple fatalities in his mines.
[16]
 During December 2004, twenty-three miners died in explosions in his mines inKazakhstan caused by faulty
gas detectors.

Mr. Mittal has been accused of running a series of coal mines in Kazakhstan with abhorrent safety records.
Between 2004 and 2007, the lax standards were responsible for the deaths of 91 coalminers and the subject of
a criminal investigation. Witnesses to a 2006 explosion, which claimed the lives of 41 people, maintain that,
despite the plumes of flammable gas, managers at the mines pushed the employees to work so that they could
meet their production as well as other targets. One employee even told the Times, "The pressures local
managers put us under to meet targets so that they can collect their bonuses are more and more stressful. We
are being exploited like animals." Former miner turned trade unionist Pavel Shumkin even claimed, "The
miners all agree: compared with life now under Mittal, for them everything was better in Soviet times."[17]

[edit]The Mittal Affair: "Cash for Influence"

Main article:  Mittal Affair

Controversy erupted in 2002 as Plaid MP Adam Price exposed the link between UK prime minister Tony
Blair and Mittal in the Mittal Affair, also known as 'Garbagegate' or Cash for Influence.[18][19][20] Mittal's LNM steel
company, registered in the Dutch Antilles and maintaining less than 1% of its 100,000 plus workforce in the UK,
sought Blair's aid in its bid to purchase Romania's state steel industry.[20] The letter from Blair to the Romanian
government, a copy of which Price was able to obtain, hinted that the privatisation of the firm and sale to Mittal
might help smooth the way for Romania's entry into the European Union.[18]

The letter had a passage in it removed just prior to Blair's signing of it, describing Mittal as "a friend."[21]

[edit]Queens Park Rangers

Recently, Mittal had emerged as a leading contender to buy and sell Barclays
Premiership clubs Wigan and Everton. However on 20 December 2007 it was announced that the Mittal family
had purchased a 20 per cent shareholding in Queens Park Rangers football club joining Flavio Briatore and
Mittal's friend Bernie Ecclestone.[22] As part of the investment Mittal's son-in-law, Amit Bhatia, took a place on
the board of directors. The combined investment in the struggling club sparked suggestions that Mittal might be
looking to join the growing ranks of wealthy individuals investing heavily in English football and emulating other
similar benefactors such as Roman Abramovich.[23]

On 19 February 2010, Flavio Briatore resigned as QPR chairman, and sold further shares in the club to Mittal,
making Mittal the single largest shareholder.[24]

[edit]Environmental damage
Mittal purchased the Irish Steel plant based in Cork from the government for a nominal fee of £1. Three years
later in 2001, it was closed, leaving 400 people redundant. Subsequent environmental issues at the site have
been a cause for criticism. The Government tried to sue in the High Court to have him pay for the clean-up of
Cork Harbour but failed. The clean up was expected to cost €70m.[25]

[edit]Personal life

He presently lives in Kensington, London. His residence at 18-19 Kensington Palace Gardens which was

purchased from Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone in 2004 for £57 million (US$128 million), making it the
world's most expensive house at the time.[26] Mittal's house in Kensington, London is decorated with marble
taken from the same quarry that supplied theTaj Mahal. The extravagant show of wealth has been referred to
as the "Taj Mittal".[27] It has 12 bedrooms, an indoor pool, Turkish baths and parking for 20 cars.[28]

Mittal bought No.6 Palace Greens, Kensington Gardens, formerly owned by financier Noam Gottesman, at
£117 million for his son Aditya Mittal who is married to Megha Mittal owner and director of the Board of the
German fashion luxury brand Escada.

Mittal bought No.9a Palace Greens, Kensington Gardens, formerly the Filipino embassy, at £70 million in 2008
for his daughter Vanisha Mittal Bhatia who is married to Amit Bhatia a businessman and a philanthropist.

Mittal owns three prime properties collectively worth £500 million on the "Billionaire's Row" at Kensington
Palace Gardens. [29]

Mittal also owns a house called Summer Palace at 46B, The Bishops Avenue, which is dubbed as "Millionares
Row" and is reportedly for sale at £40 million.

In 2005, he also bought a colonial bungalow for $7.5 million at No.22, Aurangzeb Road in New Delhi, India, the
most exclusive street in the city occupied by embassies and millionaires, and rebuilt it as a house.

In January 2011 Lakshmi Mittal bought a luxury home in Scotland. Mittal has knocked down a £4 million
property to build his new home, valued at around £15 million, making it Scotland’s most expensive home. The
Mittal mansion is coming up in one of the most elite neighbourhoods, right near the Gleneagles golf course in
Perthshire County. This luxury villa has six bedrooms and two kitchens. The wallpaper and furniture are from
Ralph Lauren’s home collection. The wooden flooring and tiles have been flown in from Germany and a super
luxe bathroom is estimated to be worth £80,000.

Mittal is now planning to build a "Zero Carbon" Footprint estate in Surrey a 340 acre estate also called
Alderbrook Park which was built as a country estate during the 19th century but was part-demolished in the
1950s and replaced with a less-attractive home. He purchased the estate for £5.25 million ands is planning to
spend £25 million on it to make it 100 per cent self-sufficient and eco-friendly. The unique modern design will
not only ensure the house is zero-carbon, but will make the entire 340-acre estate carbon negative. The house
will be built on a stone plinth, which will provide various terraces on which to enjoy the cocktail hour. It will have
at least 10 bedrooms, outdoor and indoor swimming pools, a fitness centre, an under-ground art gallery, tennis
courts, sculpture garden, an arboretum and croquet lawn.

[edit]Awards and Honours

Year of Award or
Name of Award or Honor Awarding Organization
Honor
2010 "Dostyk" 1 Republic of Kazakhstan.

2008 Forbes Lifetime Achievement Award Forbes.

2007 Padma Vibhushan President of India.

2007 Grand Cross of Civil Merit Spain.

Dwight D. Eisenhower Global Leadership

2007 Business Council for International Understanding.
Award

2007 Fellowship King's College London.

2004 European Businessman of the Year Forbes.

2004 Entrepreneur of the Year Wall Street Journal.

American Metal Market and World Steel

2004 8th honorary Willy Korf Steel Vision Award
Dynamics.

1996 Steel Maker of the Year New Steel.